ABSTRACT
Jewish education in Byzantium is a subject which remains cloaked in deepest darkness. Very little research has been done, and it must be admitted that the raw materials on which such research might be based are not, at first glance, promising. The Jewish culture of Byzantium, like its Christian counterpart, is characterised generally by a high regard for literacy and learning. The revival of Christian learning in the eleventh century is accompanied by the creation of new institutions, both permanent secondary schools, attached to churches, and also institutes of higher study, enjoying state support. The Greek philosophical and scientific heritage was in any case apparently exploited only by a small elite of advanced scholars: it did not form any part of the basic education for Jews. The few letters from or to Byzantine Jewish women preserved in the Genizah come from Egypt, and they do not allow us to make any deductions about the situation prevailing in Byzantium.
