310 r Jessica Marglin
that Jewish leaders’ conception of poverty as permanent did not prevent
them from offering both immediate and long-term solutions.
Although Jewish leaders across the world passed regulations aimed at
controlling the financial affairs of individuals, scholars have yet to note
the long-term goal of preventing poverty in other Jewish communities
in the Middle East or Europe. Limitations on consumption intended to
alleviate financial crises only took effect for short periods of time.^82 In
Meknes, however, regulations on consumption did not have time limits
attached and aimed at controlling poverty permanently. Although this
study reveals a new aspect of poverty relief, I suspect that further research
would reveal similar policies elsewhere.
Jewish leaders in Meknes used sumptuary laws as their primary strat-
egy to curb poverty. These sumptuary laws limited expenditures at family
celebrations, holidays, and other occasions. They included detailed speci-
fications of how many guests one could invite to certain events, who was
included in the acceptable list of guests (for instance, only family members
with a minimum degree of closeness), what kinds of food could be served,
and which gifts could be exchanged.^83 The earliest surviving sumptuary
laws from Meknes date from 1769; they were augmented, renewed, and
altered fairly continuously until at least 1907. The fact that Meknes’s lead-
ers constantly rewrote these laws shows on the one hand that they were
not being obeyed—otherwise, Meknesi Jews would not have required
repeated reminders of the rules—and on the other hand that they were
important enough to merit the effort of continuous reintroduction.
Although I use the term sumptuary laws to mean limitations on luxu-
ries, I do not intend it to carry the connotations associated with sumptu-
ary laws in Europe. In particular, the sumptuary laws passed in Meknes
were not aimed exclusively at the very rich. Rather, the authors’ expla-
nations demonstrate that these taqanot were intended primarily for the
middling sorts, who were the members of the community most likely to
fall into poverty by spending too much on luxury consumption.
The intended consequences of sumptuary laws passed in other Jew-
ish communities help explain their role in Meknes. Studies of sumptu-
ary regulations in Poland, France, and the Ottoman Empire reveal com-
monalities among the uses of such regulations.^84 European sumptuary
laws, aimed at preserving existing social hierarchies, included strict limits
on how much each social class was allowed to spend on particular oc-
casions.^85 Sumptuary legislation also strove to protect Jews from hostile