ABSTRACT
The term "Middle Ages," traditionally identified as the period between the years 500 and 1500 and by definition Eurocentric, is an uneasy fit for non-Christian and non-European societies. These dates are virtually meaningless when applied to Jewish history. Until the high to late Middle Ages, the oldest, largest, and most influential Jewish communities were located in the vast area that stretches from the Indian subcontinent and Central Asia to the Maghreb and Iberia in the west. This area housed the two late antique centers of Jewish learning in Babylonia and in Palestine, whose literary production would form the basis for the rabbinic library that still informs modern Jewish identities. In the Islamicate and Byzantine Jewish world, medieval letters, contracts, wills, and other documents of wealthy and poor households from cities, towns, and villages mention school fees and male and female teachers, implying that primary education was widespread.
