Halikhot Olam, Edited by Judah ben Joseph Bulat, Constantinople: 1510; Bound with Petah Devarai, David ben Judah Messer Leon, Constantinople: 1515

88 [40, 37, 11] leaves (7¾ x 5¼ in.; 192 x 132 mm). Woodcut title border, outlined in red with small ornament within a wreath; gutter and lower margins of title renewed affecting border, small hole in blank portion of title, some marginal wormtracks, light spotting and dampstaining; ownership note on second title. Eighteenth-century vellum, ms. title on spine.

Mordecai (Moritz) Chamizer (1850-1917)—his bookplate on front pastedown endpaper bears the text of Jeremiah 31:12 written in Paleo-Hebrew: "for I will turn their mourning into joy"

Vinograd, Constantinople 20, 72; Yaari, Constantinople 9, 86

88 [40, 37, 11] leaves (7¾ x 5¼ in.; 192 x 132 mm). Woodcut title border, outlined in red with small ornament within a wreath; gutter and lower margins of title renewed affecting border, small hole in blank portion of title, some marginal wormtracks, light spotting and dampstaining; ownership note on second title. Eighteenth-century vellum, ms. title on spine.
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Of the two discrete books bound together in this volume, the first includes two works on talmudic methodology. The first of these is Halikhot Olam, by the talmudist Yeshu'ah ben Joseph ha-Levi (15th century) and the second, Mevo ha-Talmud is the work of Samuel ha-Nagid (993-1055), vizier of Granada, scholar, and poet. The two works were conjoined by Judah ben Joseph Bulat, (c. 1475-c.1540), a dayyan in Constantinople, who published them in Constantinople in 1510.

Halikhot Olam is divided into five sections dealing with composition and arrangement of the Mishnah; talmudic terminology; methodology; the thirteen hermeneutic rules; and the rules for determing halakhah. Mevo ha-Talmud is a systematic description of talmudic logic and terminology.  It is printed with most editions of the Talmud, generally after tractate Berakhot. Its author, Samuel ha-Nagid, once the proprieter of a spice shop, rose to become the vizier of Granada and nagid of Spanish Jewry.

The second book in this volume is a grammatical work entitled Petah Devarai. Although the earlier incunable (Naples 1490) edition is often listed as an anonymous work, bibliographers now attribute it to David ben Judah Messer Leon (c.1470/72-c.1526). In addition to Messer Leon's text, two additional works are printed with Petah Devarai. They are Pitron Halomot, attributed to Hai Gaon and Ma'aseh Torah, a short midrashic text ascribed to the patriarch Judah ha-Nasi, the compiler of the Mishnah.