History of the Jews in Cologne

The history of the Jews in Cologne is documented from the year 321 AD, almost as long as the history of Cologne. Over its history, the Jewish community of Cologne has suffered persecutions, many expulsions, massacres and destruction. The community numbered about 19,500 people before its dispersal, murders and destruction in the 1930s by the Nazis before and during World War II. The community has re-established itself and now numbers about 4,500 members. Because of its historical continuity, today's Jewish synagogue calls itself the "oldest Jewish congregation north of the Alps".

Cologne was founded and established in the 1st century AD, as the Roman Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium in Ubii territory. It was the capital of the Roman province of Germania Inferior and the headquarters of the military in the region. Cologne was an important city in Roman times. H. Nissen assumes a much greater population for Roman Cologne than it was in the Middle Ages, when he estimates it was between 30,000–40,000. It is reasonable to assume that the spread of Christianity in any Roman province was preceded and accompanied by the existence there of Jews. The presence of Christians in Cologne in the 2nd century would therefore argue for the settlement of Jews in the city at that early date.

Judaism was recognized as a religio licita (permitted religion), and Jews were exempt from the offering to the Emperor and to the offerings to the Roman state gods. However, Jews were refused access to public offices because these were the basic requirements for access to a public office. For the appointment to a town office a person was required to own land and to have a certain reputation. In Late Antiquity, the Roman upper class increasingly refused to participate in these expensive offices, and the Roman administration went into crisis and the emperor had to look for alternatives. It became necessary for the Cologne Council to use a decree of Emperor Constantine the Great of 321, which permitted Jews to be appointed to the curia. This is the first evidence of the existence of a Jewish community in the town of Cologne. The emperor's decree was passed down in the Codex Theodosianus (439), which indicates the existence of a firmly established Jewish community in Cologne in 321 and 331. A partial translation of the Codex reads:

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