MASSEKHET PURIM AND OTHER TEXTS AND POEMS, MANUSCRIPT ON PAPER Kalonymos ben Kalonymos [17th-18th century]

26 leaves, 7 ½ x 5 ¼ inches; 190 x 134 mm, written in brown ink in Italian cursive scripts, modern foliation in pencil; six leaves (some with text) removed following the first leaf, some dampstaining, library stamp in red on second leaf and final leaf.  Leather spine, cloth boards; recased, dust-soiled, somewhat worn, with note by H. Loewe inserted at back.

Solomon Halberstam (shelf no. 373)

Hirschfeld (ms. no. 365); I. Davidson, Parody in Jewish Literature (1907); A. Neubauer, “Textes Hebraico-Italiens concernant les femmes,” in Rendiconti della R. Academia dei Lincei, 7, (1891), p. 350

Contents

Fols. 2r-11r: Massekhet Purim, a famous Purim parody.

Fols. 11v-22v: Minhat Yehuda Soneh ha-Nashim by Judah ibn Shabbethai, a satirical, misogynous, rhymed composition.  See J. Schirmann, The History of Hebrew Poetry in Christian Spain and Southern France; supplemented and annotated by E. Fleischer, (1997), pp. 129-141(in Hebrew); T. Fishman, "A Medieval Parody of Misogyny: Judah ibn Shabbethai's Minhat Yehuda Soneh ha-Nashim," in Prooftexts, 8, (1988), pp. 89-111.

Fol. 23r: Stanzi al ha-Nashim, beginning: Daatan shel nashim, in Hebrew and Italian.

Fol. 25r: Poem, beginning: va-yehi bi-mei Ahashverosh, in Hebrew and Italian.

Fol. 26r: Poem: Eini shikkor ki im sameah.

This manuscript was intended as amusement for the Jewish holiday of Purim.