Benjamin Ze'ev Kedar (; born 2 September 1938)Who's Who in Israel 2001 (Tel Aviv, 2002), p. 214: "KEDAR, Benjamin Z. is an Israeli historian, professor emeritus of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He was president of the international Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East (1995–2002), chairman of the board of the Israel Antiquities Authority (2000–12) and vice-president of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities (2010–15).Prof. Nili Cohen elected tenth President of The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. 10 June 2015. The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities site.Dean of the Faculty of Engineering Sciences at BGU, Prof. Joseph Kost elected as member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. 11 June 2015. Ben-Gurion University site. He is 2019 The EMET Prize for Art, Science and Culture laureate in history, the 2020 Israel Prize laureate in history researchKadari-Ovadia, Shira (25 February 2020). The Israel Prize in the field of general history research will be awarded to Prof. Benjamin Zeev Kedar. (Hebrew), Haaretz. in 2024 he won the Prix Gustave Schlumberger de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres.Prof. Benjamin Z. Kedar awarded a prize from the l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres and in 2026 he awarded the MGH Freiherr vom Stein Medal from the Monumenta Germaniae Historica.(July 3, 2026 ). Benjamin Z. Kedar receives the MGH Freiherr vom Stein Medal
Biography Kedar was born in Nitra, Czechoslovakia to Samuel Kraus and Lydie Jeiteles-Kraus.Lydie Jeiteles-Kraus, Eine Prager Liebe (Jerusalem, 1995). Both his parents were physicians. In 1944–45, his family avoided deportation to Auschwitz by hiding for seven months with Slovak peasants.See Hani Kedar-Kehat, My Nitra. A Family's Struggle to Survive in Slovakia. Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 2015. He immigrated to Israel with the Youth Aliyah in 1949. His parents arrived about two months later, and after a few months he went to live with them in Kfar Netter in the Sharon Plain. In 1952, he completed elementary school in Even Yehuda, and in 1956 the Fifth Municipal High School in Tel Aviv.In laudem hierosolymitani. Studies in Crusades and Medieval Culture in Honour of Benjamin Z. Kedar, ed. Iris Shagrir, Ronnie Ellenblum and Jonathan Riley-Smith. Ashgate: Aldershot, 2007. 468 introduction, p. x. He earned a BA in history and sociology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where he continued to graduate studies.In laudem hierosolymitani. Studies in Crusades and Medieval Culture in Honour of Benjamin Z. Kedar, ed. Iris Shagrir, Ronnie Ellenblum and Jonathan Riley-Smith. Ashgate: Aldershot, 2007. 468 introduction, p. x.
Kedar wrote his MA thesis under the supervision of Joshua Prawer (1964–1965)."The Jerusalem University awarded 445 academic degrees," Ma’ariv, 23 June 1966. And In laudem hierosolymitani. Studies in Crusades and Medieval Culture in Honour of Benjamin Z. Kedar, ed. Iris Shagrir, Ronnie Ellenblum and Jonathan Riley-Smith. Ashgate: Aldershot, 2007. 468 introduction, p. x. During the Lavon Affair, he was among the leaders of the "Student Movement for Democracy," that opposed David Ben-Gurion's purported authoritarianism."Differences of Opinion among Students," Ma’ariv, 5 February 1961. He wrote his PhD thesis on medieval history at Yale University, under the supervision of Roberto Sabatino Lopez, submitting his dissertation in 1969.
Kedar returned to Israel in the same year and joined the faculty of the Hebrew University. In 1976–77 he was a Humboldt Foundation research fellow at the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Munich, in 1981–82 and again in 1997–98 a member of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, and in 1983–84 a fellow of the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies in Jerusalem. In 1986, he was appointed full professor at Hebrew University. Until her death in 2015, he was married to Nurith Kenaan-Kedar, professor of Art History at Tel Aviv University, a descendant of the Shertok family and granddaughter of Baruch Katinsky, one of the founders of Tel Aviv."Baruch (Bendett) Katinsky," in David Tidhar, Encyclopedia of the Founders and Builders of Israel, vol. 3, pp. 1187 8 (in Hebrew); Ziona Rabau, I am a Tel Avivian (Tel Aviv, 1984), p. 138 (in Hebrew). He has two sons (from a previous marriage), Arnon and Yarden.
Activities within the Hebrew University During 1990–96, Kedar was chair of the Research Students Authority (Section of Humanities, Social Sciences, Law) of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 1998–2001, he chaired the university's School of History, which he founded,Diego Olstein, Thinking History Globally (New York, 2015), p. xiv.; Also in the introduction to In Laudem Hierosolymitani, p. xi. and where he introduced inter alia a course in world history compulsory for all incoming history students.the introduction to In Laudem Hierosolymitani, p. xi. By teaching this course, Yuval Noah Harari evolved into a leading proponent of Big History. From 2001 to 2005, Kedar was director of the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies.Benjamin Z. Kedar is given the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, Honoris Causa, Haifa University site.
Activities outside the Hebrew University In 1987–92, Kedar chaired of the Standing Committee on Teachers' Colleges of the Council for Higher Education in Israel. During 2001–7, he was chair of the Section of Humanities of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. During his incumbency he wrote two reports: the first discusses the future of the Humanities in Israel, and the second appraises the historical research in Israeli universities;the historical research in Israeli universities. both were published in 2007. In 2000–12, Kedar chaired the board of the Israel Antiquities Authority. Kedar is a corresponding fellow of the Medieval Academy of America (since 2005),Medieval Academy of America, Corresponding Fellows. and of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica (since 2006). In 2001, he founded Crusades, Journal of the Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East (SSCLE), and has co-edited it with Jonathan Riley-Smith, and later with Jonathan Phillips. During 1995–2002, he was president of SSCLE, whose quadrennial conferences he convened in 1987 and 1999. In 2007 he was awarded an honorary degree by Haifa University.
In his first book, October 1973: The Story of an Armored Battalion, Kedar describes the battles of the battalion in which he served during the Yom Kippur War as communications NCO. The foreword to this book was written by the then division commander, later Israel's prime minister, Ariel Sharon. Kedar has written numerous opinion articles in Israel's daily newspapers; most of them were collected in a booklet.Kedar, Apocrypha, 1954–2004 (Modi`in, 2005).
In 2010, Kedar was elected vice-president of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities alongside president Ruth Arnon. Their term ended in September 2015.Asaf Shtull-Trauring (22 June 2010). Academy of Sciences and Humanities Elects Prof. Ruth Arnon as Its First Woman President in Haarets.
Research Comparative history Kedar's research spans different periods and cultures, with an emphasis on the European Middle Ages and the crusades. His studies compare different civilizations, utilizing a variety of qualitative and quantitative methods. Thus for example he compared, In his Crusade and Mission: European Approaches toward the Muslims (Princeton University Press, 1984)Crusade and Mission: European Approaches toward the Muslims. Princeton University Press: Princeton, 1984 (paperback edition, 1988). the attitudes toward the Muslims that took shape in Byzantium and Western Europe as well as among Eastern Christians, and. compared developments along Latin Europe's three fronts with the realm of Islam: Iberia, Sicily and the Frankish Levant. Other comparative studies deal with medieval cartography in Korea, China, the Muslim world, Western Europe as well as in pre-Columbian America; with Muslim, Byzantine and Frankish hospitals; with legislation in the Frankish Kingdom of Jerusalem and in Byzantium; and the comparative dimensions of medieval pilgrimage. Kedar's interest in the theoretical aspects of this sub-discipline led him to study outlines for comparative history set forth from the late 19th century onward.See Kedar, "Outlines for Comparative History proposed by Practicing Historians," in Benjamin Z. Kedar (ed.), Explorations in Comparative History (Jerusalem, 2009), pp. 1–28.
Economic depression and merchant mentality Kedar's first major research, based on his PhD dissertation, was published in 1976 by Yale University Press;Merchants in Crisis: Genoese and Venetian Men of Affairs and the Fourteenth-Century Depression. Yale University Press: New Haven and London, 1976. 260 pp. an expanded version was translated into Italian.Mercanti in crisi a Genova e Venezia nel '300. Jouvence: Rome, 1981. It examines the impact of the 14th century economic depression on the mentality of Genoese and Venetian merchants and reveals that the depression entailed a shrinkage of horizons, a decrease in daring, and a growing quest for security. The idea of insurance arose during this period, the geographical range of activity diminished and, instead of advancing to new regions, commerce was now largely limited to the long-known Mediterranean and Black Seas. Kedar concluded that "the successful exploits in the late 13th century drove some [merchants] to attempt the objectively unfeasible, whereas the setbacks in the mid-14th century made even the objectively feasible seem too hazardous to try."Kedar, Merchants in Crisis, p. 132. In later years, Kedar made various contributions to the history of Genoa, from drawing attention to a new Arabic source on the Muslim attack on Genoa in 934 to a study of the Genoese notariate in 1382."Segurano-Sakran Salvaygo: Un mercante genovese al servizio dei sultani mamalucchi, c. 1303–1322," in Fatti e idee di storia economica nei secoli XII–XX. Studi dedicati a Franco Borlandi (Bologna, 1976), pp. 75–91; (with E. Ashtor:) "Una guerra fra Genova e i Mamlucchi negli anni 1380," Archivio Storico Italiano 133 (1975), 3–44; "The Genoese Notaries of 1382: The Anatomy of an Urban Occupational Group," in The Medieval City. Studies in Honor of Robert S. Lopez, ed. H.A. Miskimin, D. Herlihy and A.L. Udovitch (New Haven and London, 1977), pp. 73-94; "Chi era Andrea Franco?" Atti della Società ligure di Storia Patria 91 (1977), 371–77; "Una nuova fonte per l'incursione musulmana del 934-935 e le sue implicazioni per la storia genovese," in Oriente e Occidente fra medioevo ed età moderna: Studi in onore di Geo Pistarino, ed. L. Balletto (Genoa, 1997), pp. 605–16.
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