Cover Band 22 von "Das Mittelalter – Beihefte" mit dem Titel "Fake News im Mittelalter? Untertitel: Zur kulturellen Aushandlung von Falschheit in politischen, religiösen und literarischen Diskursen"

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Heß, Cordelia: Fakten schaffen: Ritualmord und making sense durch antijüdische Ausschreitungen, in Bubert, Marcel and Doering, Pia Claudia (Eds.): Fake News im Mittelalter? Zur kulturellen Aushandlung von Falschheit in politischen, religiösen und literarischen Diskursen, Heidelberg: Heidelberg University Publishing, 2026 (Das Mittelalter. Perspektiven mediävistischer Forschung. Beihefte, Volume 22), p. 121–140. https://doi.org/10.17885/heiup.1552.c24224

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https://doi.org/10.17885/heiup.1552
ISBN 978-3-96822-204-2 (PDF)
ISBN 978-3-96822-205-9 (Hardcover)

Published

03/12/2026

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Authors

Cordelia Heß

Fakten schaffen

Ritualmord und making sense durch antijüdische Ausschreitungen

Abstract How did people in the 12th and 13th centuries come up with the idea of blaming Jews for the violent deaths of children which resulted in spontaneous killings and expulsions? Existing research on ritual murder alle­gations has so far often attempted to reconstruct concrete ways of conveying information from the contradictory written sources. This article discusses the cases in Nor­wich, Fulda, Hagenau and Pforzheim with the help of two theories from the field of communication studies and cog­nitive psychology: “FLICC” for the production and legiti­mization of fake news and the “illusory truth effect”. The methods of verification and legitimation of ritual murder allegations show distinct similarities to those invoked in contemporary discussions of climate change denial or the Covid-19 pandemic. The ritual murder accusations are thus interpreted in the context of a complex web of anti-Jewish stereotypes on the one hand and violence on the other, which makes the question of knowledge transfer in the specific case superfluous.

Keywords blood libel; antisemitism; transmission of in­formation; violence