Early Medieval Literature

An Overview of the Main Types of Jewish Writing

The principal genres of literary writing by Jews in the early medieval period were the following. 

• Poetry, either liturgical (piyyut) or nonliturgical (“secular”). 
• Fictional narratives, usually tales or legends.
• Nonfictional narratives, either historical writing or travel writing.
• Polemics.

Jews during this period wrote primarily in Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic, but a few texts are also in Judeo-Persian.

Personal narratives did not, strictly speaking, constitute a genre of writing during this period. Some first-person poetic laments for family members have a distinctly emotional feel, detailing at length the death of loved ones and the mourning that follows. Those few prose autobiographical accounts that survive were usually composed for a particular purpose, perhaps as conversion stories or as anecdotal episodes for polemics. Many are authorial digressions within other works. Others, such as an author’s introduction or a scribe’s colophon, concisely offer just a few personal details. In a handful of travel narratives, such as that by Benjamin of Tudela, the author describes his journey, often to the land of Israel, sprinkled with charmingly unlikely local legends.