At the fall of Carcassonne in 1209, the Jews of Béziers took refuge in Catalonia and rebuilt a community in the small town of Olot. It is known that the Jewish communities of Languedoc and Catalonia maintained commercial, cultural and religious relations. In the thirteenth century, Catalonia therefore absorbed a large number of Jews fleeing the war raging in Languedoc.

Olot was destroyed in an earthquake in 1427, there are consequently no traces of the Jewish presence in this city from 1209. The only irrefutable proof of the establishment of the community of Béziers in Olot is the dedication of the new synagogue in a stone that was found in the 1940s, in the ruins of the chapel of the cemetery of Olot, burned at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. She is currently exhibited at the museum-treasure of Sant Estève d’Olot church.

Source: Museum-treasure of Sant Estève d’Olot church – Carme Grau i Oliveras