Talmud Yerushalmi (Jerusalem Talmud), Venice: Daniel Bomberg, 1523

266 leaves (15¼ x 10 in.; 387 x 254 mm). 4 parts in one volume, Woodcut title borders and head-pieces; outer portion of first title soiled and spotted with a few worm punctures extending into the next few leaves, some light marginal worming near end. Seventeenth-century Dutch vellum, blind-ruled, with arabesque medallion stamped in central panel, gold-stamped title label on spine; soiled with a few scratches.

Abraham Piso- his inscription on first text page

Vinograd, Venice 89; Haberman 90

266 leaves (15¼ x 10 in.; 387 x 254 mm). 4 parts in one volume, Woodcut title borders and head-pieces; outer portion of first title soiled and spotted with a few worm punctures extending into the next few leaves, some light marginal worming near end. Seventeenth-century Dutch vellum, blind-ruled, with arabesque medallion stamped in central panel, gold-stamped title label on spine; soiled with a few scratches.
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The editio princeps of the Jerusalem Talmud was undertaken by Daniel Bomberg  only after the completion of the printing of the Babylonian Talmud and a year before the printing of the Mishneh Torah of Maimonides. This edition was based upon the sole extant manuscript of the Jerusalem Talmud, known today as the Leiden manuscript, which was written by Jehiel ben Jekuthiel ben Benjamin ha-Rofe in 1289. The scribe explicitly states that he copied it from a woefully corrupt text, full of errors; begging the indulgence of his readers, the scribe states that although he had attempted to correct it as much as possible, "I know that I have not corrected even half of the mistakes." While this manuscript was the basis of the printed text, Bomberg's editor, Jacob ben Hayyim ibn Adonijah, had at his disposal three other manuscripts, now lost, which he calls "accurate" ones.

An amalgam of the teachings of the academies of Tiberias, Caesarea, and Sepphoris, the Jerusalem Talmud was compiled in the Land of Israel, though not in Jerusalem as its name would imply; in point of fact it is more correctly, though less usually, referred to as Talmud di-Venei Ma'arava (Talmud of the West.)  Just as its Babylonian counterpart, the Jerusalem Talmud is essentially the result of discussions on and elaboration of the text of the earlier Mishna. The existing text of the Jerusalem Talmud consists of four of the six Mishnaic orders, Zera'im, Mo'ed, Nashim, and Nezikin.