ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the subtleties of the system of guardianship as practiced by the Jews of medieval Perpignan. It explores the strategies this community employed in rearing the children of dead fathers and measures the effect these strategies had on their widowed mothers. Jewish wills from the kingdoms of medieval Iberia are very rare. For thirteenth-century Perpignan, there are only four Latin wills of Jewish testators and no Hebrew documents, and this is the largest group for a town of the Realms of Aragon during this period. Jewish families worked together to care for their fatherless children. Botina's case shows that Jewish widows received some benefit from acting as part of a group. For one thing, Botina's own financial situation was not threatened by her assuming the responsibility of guardianship. By all rights, the finances of a Jewish widowed mother should have been absolutely distinct from those of her children.
