Folk literature, in its various genres, is a central channel for expression of the communal memory. In this seminar we shall meet with Jewish folk narratives from Antiquity to Modern era and try to figure how groups and individual in the Jewish people told their past to themselves in legends, myths, sagas and personal narratives. We shall try to understand the various meanings and functions of folklore in the main social processes that Jews went through. Part of the seminar is dedicated to theoretical and methodological discussions about folk literature as historical source and exploring connections between history, memory and story.