Bidspirit auction | Jewish Beggar. Hand-Colored Ceramic. Germany

Jewish Beggar. Hand-Colored Ceramic. Germany ca. 1870 - Porcelain figurine, hand-colored in green, of a Jewish beggar sitting with his legs crossed.  Signed Karl Maximilian Wurtenberger.  The Jewish Beggars (Betteljuden in German) was the title of the status-lacking Jewish population of the German countries of the 17th and 18th centuries. The Jews of the German countries had the official status of Schutzjude (”protected Jews”). During the 17th century, following the Khmelnytsky Uprising and the 1648-1649 Riots, many Jewish refugees from Poland travelled west; some of them reached the German countries. They joined local Jews who became poor during the Thirty Years' War and could not pay the protection money.     Provenance: The Bloch Family Collection, Melbourne-Australia.