ABSTRACT
Marlowe, due to his empathy and perception of the circumstances of that period, mentioned Hebrew, Arabic and Greek in this famous poem. Secondary sources do not frequently mention the Jews. Harold Lamb, whose Tamerlane (1928) became perhaps the most popular biography of Timur in the twentieth century, mentioned the Jews in his narrative when discussing Samarkand,‘a bedlam of tongues, and a babel of varied prayer’. 2 When Hilda Hookham wrote Timur’s biography in a more scientific manner in 1962, the Jews are mentioned twice with references to Mignanelli’ta Tamerlan (1414). 3 In both cases these references appear to be inaccurate, as Hookham was not aware that Mignanelli’s story about the ill-fated events concerning the Jewish people in Aleppo in 1400 was a retelling of a legend similar to Wolffs story of 1840 about the Jewish prime minister who served under Timur (see Prologue and Chapter 10).
