In the meantime the silly and sinister fables which caused the persecution of the Jews in England and elsewhere met with credence in Spain also. But, if the pious were exasperated by these stories, less foolish persons found a sufficient food for their spleen in the better founded charges of rapacity constantly brought against the Jewish money-lenders; while the holy indignation of others was aroused by the occasional sight of Christian proselytes seeking in the arms of the Synagogue a spiritual rest which they could not find in the Church; or by the spectacle, even less edifying, of Christian noblemen seeking in the arms of a Jewish bride the wherewithal to regild their tarnished escutcheons. All these grievances, assiduously nursed by fanatical clerics and loudly voiced by insolvent debtors, culminated in violent attacks upon the “accursed people” during the fourteenth century. The Jewish colonies were repeatedly looted and burnt and the inmates slaughtered without mercy and without regard to sex or age. ♦About 1330♦ In one attack of this kind in the kingdom of Navarre no fewer than ten thousand Israelites perished. But the time had not yet come for a general persecution of Israel in Spain. The demon of Jew-hatred, if irritated, was also curbed by kingly favour. ♦1325–1350♦ Alfonso XI. drew down upon himself the wrath of pious Christians by employing Jewish ministers in his treasury. Under this prince the Spanish Jews, indeed, enjoyed what some writers have described as their Golden Age. They were powerful at Court, and equally influential with the great nobility, many Castilian magnates employing them as bailiffs and advisers. Their wealth and their power cowed clerical and popular fanaticism, and overawed the avaricious proclivities of impecunious hidalgos. ♦1350–1369♦ This prosperity lasted under Alfonso’s successor, Don Pedro, or Peter the Cruel. Samuel Levi, treasurer to the King and his victim, is reported to have left behind him the princely fortune of 400,000 ducats; an affluence which proved his undoing. ♦1333–1379♦