Lot 179
  • 179

Nevi'im Rishonim (Former Prophets), Daniel Bomberg, Venice: 1524 Volume II of the Second Rabbinic Bible Printed on Vellum

Estimate
10,000 - 12,000 USD
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Description

162 [of 209] leaves (16 1/8 x 10¾ in.; 410 x 273 mm). Printed on vellum;  collation: 301, 36-548, 559=162 leaves, lacking 302-8, 31-35; title within woodcut architectural frame; title shorter at fore-margin and lower margin with stains and cockling, mostly marginal soiling and staining throughout with some spotting especially on last few leaves, a few marginal mends. Modern morocco, gilt-stamped title on spine; joints rubbed.

Literature

Vinograd, Venice 99; Habermann, 93; Darlow & Moule 5085; Freimann, Die hebraischen Pergamentdrucke, 51; Brad Sabin Hill, "Catalogue of Hebrew Books Printed on Vellum," in Books Printed on Vellum in the Collections of the British Library.1996, pp.179-213

Condition

162 [of 209] leaves (16 1/8 x 10¾ in.; 410 x 273 mm). Printed on vellum; collation: 301, 36-548, 559=162 leaves, lacking 302-8, 31-35; title within woodcut architectural frame; title shorter at fore-margin and lower margin with stains and cockling, mostly marginal soiling and staining throughout with some spotting especially on last few leaves, a few marginal mends. Modern morocco, gilt-stamped title on spine; joints rubbed.
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Catalogue Note

The first Rabbinic Bible was published by Daniel Bomberg in Venice and completed in 1517. The editor for that edition was the convert Felix Pratensis. Some copies of the edition appeared with a Latin dedication to the Pope as well as a short Papal approbation (also in Latin) granting this edition the exclusive right of publication for 10 years.  Not surprisingly, the editorship by an apostate and the approval of the Pope led many Jews to avoid the edition. Six years later in 1524, the second Rabbinic Bible appeared. This time Bomberg emphasized that his printers were pious Jews, as was his scholarly editor, Jacob ben Hayyim Ibn Adonijah.  The work appeared in Venice, in four folio volumes, 1524-25, and quickly found favor among both Jewish and Christian scholars, including as it did numerous additional commentaries including those of Rashi, Kimhi, Nahmanides, Gersonides and others. Perhaps even more significant to the scholarly reader was the inclusion for the first time in print of the entire apparatus of the Masorah Parva, the Masorah Magna, and the Masorah Finalis.

As with other early Venetian imprints a very few luxury copies were produced on vellum. According to Brad Sabin Hill, no copy on vellum exists in the British Library and Friemann states that a copy in eight volumes was in the collection of Baron Guenzburg.