JSS Welcomes Yair Mintzker

The NC Jewish Studies Seminar welcomes Yair Mintzker (Princeton U.)

Yair Mintzker studies the history of early modern and modern Germany, with particular interest in the Sattelzeit (1750-1850).

Professor Mintzker is the author of The Defortification of the German City, 1689-1866 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012; paperback 2014), which tells the story of the metamorphosis of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century German cities from walled to defortified (open) places. His second book, The Many Deaths of Jew Süss (New York: Princeton University Press, 2017), is a retelling of the trial and execution of Joseph Süss Oppenheimer, the notorious "Jew Süss."

Born and raised in Jerusalem, Professor Mintzker received his M.A. in history cum laude magna from Tel-Aviv University (2003) and his Ph.D. from Stanford University (2009). He is the recipient of several prizes, including the Fritz Stern Dissertation Prize (2010) and the Urban History Association best book prize (2014), as well as fellowships from the DAAD, the Whiting Foundation, the Stanford Humanities Center, the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton, and the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin.