Ashkenazim adapted their traditions to Europe and underwent a transformation in their interpretation of Judaism. Under the influence of the Haskalah and the struggle for emancipation, as well as the intellectual and cultural ferment in urban centres, some gradually abandoned Yiddish in favor of German and developed new forms of Jewish religious life and cultural identity.
Throughout the centuries, Ashkenazim made significant contributions to Europe's philosophy , scholarship, literature , art , music , and science. Genetic studies indicate that Ashkenazim have both Levantine and European mainly southern and eastern European ancestry. These studies draw diverging conclusions about the degree and sources of European admixture , with some focusing on the European genetic origin in Ashkenazi maternal lineages, contrasting with the predominantly Middle Eastern genetic origin in paternal lineages.
The name Ashkenazi derives from the biblical figure of Ashkenaz , the first son of Gomer , son of Japhet , son of Noah , and a Japhetic patriarch in the Table of Nations Genesis The name of Gomer has often been linked to the Cimmerians. In Jeremiah , Ashkenaz figures as one of three kingdoms in the far north, the others being Minni and Ararat corresponding to Urartu , called on by God to resist Babylon. Yoma 10a; y.
Megillah 71b the name Gomer is rendered as Germania , which elsewhere in rabbinical literature was identified with Germanikia in northwestern Syria, but later became associated with Germania. In the 10th-century History of Armenia of Yovhannes Drasxanakertc'i 1.
Sometime in the Early Medieval period, the Jews of central and eastern Europe came to be called by this term. In the Mahzor Vitry , the kingdom of Ashkenaz is referred to chiefly in regard to the ritual of the synagogue there, but occasionally also with regard to certain other observances.
