Iggeret Ogeret, Isaac Akrish, [Italy, 17th century]

This volume contains selections from Iggeret Ogeret, a collection of polemical writings compiled and published by Isaac Akrish in Constantinople, 1575. Akrish (b. 1530) was a talmudic scholar, traveler, and publisher. The son of a Spanish exile, he had lived in Naples, traveled extensively, and then removed to Salonika. His special interest was in manuscripts which he attempted to save from destruction. Between 1575 and 1578 he published three highly important collections of books and documents he had assembled during his travels. This volume includes some of the polemical letters by Isaac (Profiat) Duran and Astruc Rimoch, verses by Isaac Tarfon, (cf. Davidson, Thesaurus of Medieval Poetry, letter alef 3410), verses sent by Solomon ben Simon Duran to Nathan Nagar with the latter’s reply (also published in a fuller recension in the edition of Duran’s responsa, nos. 259-260). The manuscript ends with an ingenious poem composed by Joseph ben Sheshet Ibn Latimi in the year 1308; it consists of one thousand words, each of which begins with the letter alef (cf. Davidson, alef 20).

Sotheby’s is grateful to Menahem Schmelzer z”l and Benjamin Richler for cataloguing this manuscript.

Provenance

Solomon Halberstam (shelf no. 338)

Physical Description

66 leaves on paper (4 blank), 6 1/8 x 4 inches; 155 x 100 mm, written in Italian semi-cursive script in brown ink, catchwords, original foliation in ink, modern foliation in pencil; library stamps on first and last leaves. Mottled calf binding, spine gilt; slightly rubbed.

Literature

Hirschfeld (ms. no. 446); on Profiat Duran, see F. Talmage, The Polemical Writings of Profiat Duran (Jerusalem, 1981, in Hebrew); F. Baer, The Jews in Christian Spain (196-1966)