Collection of Grammatical, Philosophical, and Miscellaneous Writings, Scribe: Jair ben Shabbetai of Correggio, [Italy], 1567

Fols. 1r-2v: On the vocalization of Biblical words, from David Kimhi’s Mikhlol.

Fol. 3r: Words in the Bible containing the letter si”n from Moses Zacuto, with the blessing for the living.

Fols. 4r- 15v: Grammar, which is called Kelalei ha-Dikduk in another manuscript in St. Petersburg.

Fols. 17r- 19v: Grammatical notes; fol.17r: Eliezer, Sefer ha-Dikduk; fol.18r: Italian written in Hebrew characters.

Fols. 20r-57v: Sefer Leshon Zahav, a brief grammar collected from various works, with some Italian in Hebrew characters on the margin. Includes poetics on fols. 55r-57v.

Fol. 57v: Colophon: katuv u-mehubbar, written and collected by Jair ben Shabbethai of Correggio, 1567.

Fols. 58r-60v: Commentary on the Thirteen Hermeneutical Rules, with a folding sheet attached to fol. 58v.

Fols. 61r-63v: A brief list of explanations to technical massoretic terms.

Fols. 64r-83r: Sefer Hegyon Libbi, explanation of technical terms in logic, with some Italian words in Hebrew characters. Fol. 83r: main principles included in the Written and in the Oral Torah.

Fols. 86r-107v: Lev Mevin, a collection of philosophical statements: fols.86r-88v: dialectics; fols.89r-100v: Sefer ha-Middot, from Aristotle’s Ethics; fols. 101r-107v: Maamare Sefer filosofiya tivi’t, on physics by Alessandro Piccolomini; on fol. 107v, the scribe, Jair ben Shabbethai, apologizes for copying the philosophical passages without extensive explanations. He intended his collection for those who read and studied philosophical works extensively.

Fol. 108r: The names of the Zodiac in Hebrew and in Italian.

Fol. 109r-v: On measuring the water for a mikveh, with diagram.

Fols. 115r-119v: Principles for the study of Mishnah, also for chronology, coins, measures.

Fol. 126r-v: Poem by Solomon Alkabetz: Keter elyon reshit le-kol nivra.

Fols. 127r-131r: The thirteen principles of Maimonides, as formulated in the poem yigdal; seventeen objections and their rejection, based on J. Albo’s Sefer Ikkarim (book 1, chapter 3); nine principles about the commandments by Gersonides (from the introduction to his commentary on the Pentateuch).

According to the colophon (fol. 57v), Jair ben Shabbethai of Correggio copied and collected the materials present in this manuscript. They include grammatical, philosophical, astrological, and hermeneutical writings. The multifaceted nature of this anthology reflects the wide-ranging interests of a sixteenth-century Jewish scholar in Italy.

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

Provenance

Solomon Halberstam (shelf no. 229)

Physical Description

131 leaves (fols. 16 , 79, 84-85, 110-114, 120-125 blank), 6 x 4 1/4 inches; 152 x 108 mm, written in a sixteenth–century Italian cursive script in brown ink, catchwords, modern foliation in pencil; fols. 10 and 199 loose. Stiff boards; stained, both hinges loose.

Literature

Hirschfeld (ms. no. 413)