Elias Le Eveske
ELIAS LE EVESKE
ELIAS LE EVESKE (Elijah ben Berechiah ha-Kohen; before 1200–after 1259), archpresbyter of English Jewry (1243–57). Born in London before 1200, Elias Le Eveske (or l'Eveske, as he was often known) was a prominent figure in the London Jewish community by 1230. His period of office coincided with the most outrageous of the royal exactions by Henry iii. In 1253 he appeared before Earl Richard of Cornwall and the Royal Council and made a pathetic appeal for permission for the Jews to leave the country. He was deposed from office in 1257 and two years later became converted to Christianity, together with his two sons. His subsequent life is unknown.
bibliography:
H.P. Stokes, Studies in Anglo-Jewish History (1913), 12–17, 30–33; Rigg-Jenkinson, Exchequer, passim; Roth, England, index; jhsem, 2 (1935), index. add. bibliography: odnb online; J. Hillaby, "London: The Thirteenth Century Jewry Revisited,"in: jhset, 32 (1990–92), 89–158.
[Cecil Roth]