Die Kuranten

The Dinstagishe un Fraytagishe Kuranten was the earliest known Yiddish-language periodical, founded by Uri Phoebus Halevi (also known as Uri Fayvesh ben Aharon ha-Levi). It was a semi-weekly founded in Amsterdam in 1686, that was published on Tuesdays (Dinstag) and Fridays (Fraytag) and it lasted for little over one year. It covered local news and news from other Jewish communities, including those as far away as India. Issues of the paper were discovered in 1902 by the librarian David Montezinos.

Die Kuranten is considered by some as the oldest Jewish newspaper, although others consider the Spanish-language Gazeta de Amsterdam from 1672 as the oldest Jewish newspaper. Die Kuranten was the first publication not only published by the Jews, but addressed to and for the Jewish community, unlike the Spanish-language Gazeta de Amsterdam, which was not explicitly Jewish but had a predominantly Jewish readership, first published in 1672. The Yiddish used in Die Kuranten was notable for its lack of Hebrew-Aramaic elements and focused on news both specifically Jewish, such as the murder of a Jew in Hamburg and the fate of the Jewish community in Budapest during the war with the Ottoman Empire.