But in Russia proper the race of Israel continued to be, as tradition declares it always to have been, harshly treated—such Israelites, that is to say, as were still permitted to dwell in the country, the Jews generally having been expelled from it, as the reader has learned (A.D. 1113). Late, however, in the previous, and early in the present century, during the last years of the long reign of Ivan III., a most singular apostasy to Judaism is recorded to have taken place, the truth of which we should certainly be inclined to doubt, if it had not been so respectably attested. A Jew named Zacharias, about A.D. 1490, began to attempt the conversion of certain Russian priests to Judaism, and succeeded to an extraordinary extent in the design. The converts adopted all the Jewish rites, except that of circumcision; which they dispensed with, because, in event of discovery, it would be a certain proof against them. The apostasy spread rapidly and widely. Ecclesiastics occupying the highest positions in the Church, even the Patriarch Zosimus himself, became perverts. The conspiracy, if it may be so called, was at last discovered, and a great number of these ‘secret Jews’ summoned before the council and convicted. They were punished after a more merciful manner than that adopted towards their brethren in Spain. They were set on horseback, with their faces towards the tails of their steeds, dressed after a bizarre fashion to resemble devils, and paraded through the streets amid the jeers of the rabble. Zosimus was sent back to the monastery of which he had been archimandrite. But, though the evil was detected, it is doubtful whether it was extirpated. It is said to have lingered in the Russian Church long afterwards. Rabbi Joseph ben Meir is the great Jewish historian of this period. He was born at Avignon in 1496, and wrote a _Universal History_, and a _History of his own Times_. The latter, though its statements must be taken with reserve, is regarded generally as a valuable book. David Gans also, born 1541, was a renowned scholar and author. He died in Prague, A.D. 1613. FOOTNOTES: [172] See Appendix V. [173] In the reign of Henry III. in England, at the inquest held on Hugh of Lincoln, A.D. 1255, it was declared that the whole of the Jews in England were privy to, and guilty of, the crime.