Guadalajara (Ar. Wādī al-Ḥijāra) is located 56 kilometers (35 miles) northeast of Madrid on the left bank of the Henares River. It is mentioned only sporadically in Arabic sources. The only known mention of the Jewish population of Guadalajara from before 1290 is in a poem that Judah ha-Levi wrote to Joseph ha-Nasi Ibn Ferruziel, also called Cidello, on the occasion of his visit there in the last decade of the eleventh century.

According to Haim Beinart, Ibn Ferruziel rescued the Jews of Guadalajara in 1085 when Alfonso VI conquered the city and took them prisoner. Ashtor proposes…