| Abstract: | Consistories were created by Napoleon I in 1808 to administer Jewish religious matters and facilitate the acculturation of French Jews. This collection contains diverse materials relating to Jewish communal life in nineteenth-century France, and includes personal and official correspondence, drafts, engravings, essays, community and organization records, accounts and financial records, petitions, demographical statistics, reports and membership lists. The Consistorial system was dissolved in 1905, after which some Consistories regrouped into Consistorial associations ("Associations consistoriales"). | |