MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE   Among the descendants of Marranos who did not return to Judaism, he was one of the most original thinkers of the 16th century France: His mother was Maria de Lopez and his father also were issued from Marrano families who had settled in Bordeaux. Montaigne actually served as the mayor of this city for a few years.

According to the late Prof. Salo Baron (vol. XIII, 119) "Montaigne's awareness of his Jewish antecedents, which he outwardly ignored, may have contributed to his moderate religious skepticism." There is not a single high-school student in France who does not study the Essays of Montaigne and I, for one, did not know he was of Jewish descent.

Having mentioned the name of the Lopez family, I would like to mention also that Aaron Lopez of Newport, Rhode Island, one of the benefactors of this community, which is one of the oldest ones in the US, sent one of his ships to Lisbon in the early 1750s to rescue his Marrano brother and his family, who all returned to Judaism when they reached America!