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156 :

.

Artisans 'Aruk

THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA

156 For the actual trades in which Handicrafts, Occupations; for

Of the actual trades followed, the most popular making of clothing and shoes, just as in the non-Jewish population. The cigar and jewelry

a Jewish monopoly.

are the

Jews engage

trades also are favorite occupations of the Jews; thus over 60 per cent of the diamond-polishers of Amsterdam are of Jewish faith.. All these are

and

mainly trades that can be followed at home in the worker's own hours, and are known to the economist as "domestic industries." Jewish workmen drift into these naturally, as thereby they are en-

abled to refrain from labor on their Sabbath. Besides, the simpler processes of the tailoring and shoemaking trades are easily acquired, and therefore prove attractive to the Russo-Jewish immigrants. This has given rise to much so-called "sweating." However, it is in Russia especially that the Jews have shown the readiest inclination to manual industries; the large number of nearly 400,000 mentioned in the foregoing table applies only to the fifteen governments of the Russian Pale of Settlement in 1898, and must be supplemented by at least another 200,000 for Poland, where Jews are rapidly taking to manufactures. In 1888, of the Jews of the Pale, 12 per cent, were Artisans, which is a higher proportion than in the general communities of either France or Prussia and the percentage had increased by 1898. Despite the fact that there are so many Jewish Artisans, the proportion of Jews earning their living by manual labor is generally much less than that of the general populations among whom they dwell. This is mainly due to the fact that they are Concentrated in the towns. The following table gives the percentage of adult workers among the Jews and the rest of the population for the countries and towns mentioned at the time indicated

Place.

Others. "'

Italy ....

1870

Prussia..

18(51

12.5 18.97

39.41

1895

19.31

36.06

1871 1871

21.4 22.9

57.2

1891

16.5

18.3

1869

16.27

41.23

do Berlin

.

Budapest

" Statist. -|

Jahib." Schwabe. Korosi.

"

do

Vienna

Authority. Jacobs. Engel.



..

-]

Statist.

Jahrb." Jeitteles.

see

the influence on their position see Social Condition, for the recent attempts to train handworkers see Education, Technical.

Bibliography: Jacobs, Studies in Jewish

Statistics, iv., vi., Proletariat Meconnu, L. Soloweitschik, Brussels, 1898 (English statistics to be used with caution).

Un

London, 1891

J-

A.

BENJAMIN

Chief rabbi of the ARTOM, Spanish and Portuguese congregation of London; born at Asti, Italy, in

1835; died at Brighton, near London, Jan. 6, 1879. He was left fatherless when a child, his maternal uncle supervised his early

and

His theologeducation he owed

training. ical

to the rabbis Marco Tedeschi, of Trieste,

Terracini. At and twenty he taught He-

brew, Italian, French, English, and German.

His

first

appointment

Benjamin Artom.

was that of minister "While to the congregation of Saluzzo near Genoa. rabbi of a congregation in Naples he received a call to London, where he was installed as chief rabbi of the Spanish and Portuguese congregations of the United Kingdom (Dec. 16, 1866). After a year's stay in England, he became so proficient in English that he could preach in that language with eloquence. Deeply interested in Anglo-Jewish institutions, he directed his attention chiefly to organizing and superintending the educational establishments of his own congregation, the Sha'are Tikvali and Villareal schools. Although of Orthodox views, he welcomed moderate reforms, and endeavored to promote any enterprise tending toward the union of discordant factions. He was author of various odes and prayers in

Hebrew, and several pieces of Italian poetry. A sermons delivered in England was

selection of his

This table shows by comparison that the percentage of Jewish Artisans in the countries and cities specified averages only one-half of the number of handicraftsmen of other faiths. This is not so much due to any aversion on the part of Jews to manual exertion as to their special attraction to and capacity for commercial pursuits (see Commerce). Up to within a few years the Jewish Artisans did not show much inclination to combine and organize themselves in to gilds or unions; but recently a large number of trades-unions and benefit societies have been formed

by them in Wilna, London, and New York. Jews show a special aptitude for work in which great muscular strength is not required, but are capable of working for many consecutive hours. Their capabilities for higher or finished workmanship is a matIn London and New York they have ter of dispute. certainly revolutionized the cheap-clothing trade, and by that means seriously affected the trade in second-hand clothing, which was itself until recently

published in 1873. Bibliography: Jewish Chronicle, January, 1879; Jewish World, January, 1879 London Times, January, 1879.

G. L.

J.

ARTOM, ISAAC

diplomat, financier, and author born at Asti, Piedmont, Dec. 31, 1829; died at Rome Jan. 24, 1900, and was buried at Asti. At the age of sixteen he was ready for the university but the higher schools of Piedmont excluded Jews, so he, in 1846, removed to Pisa, where he entered the university to study law. At the outbreak of the revolution against Austria in 1848, Artom, despite his frail constitution, joined the students' battalion commanded by Professor Montanelli, and took part in the battles of Curtatone and Montanara. At the close of the war he resumed the study of law, and in 1853 received a doctor's degree from the University of Turin. In 1855 Artom entered the Foreign Office of Tuscany in the capacity of volunteer, or supernumerary,





Italian patriot,