A Model Ketubbah Created for the Jews of New York: [London]: 1738

1 leaf (19 x 14 1/2 in.; 483 x 370 mm). Border and three large decorated initial words printed, balance of text completed in manuscript, ink on paper; Hebrew and Aramaic written in Sephardic semi-cursive script; Portuguese written in eighteenth century cursive. Creased at folds with some losses affecting text; marginal losses to left side affecting image; some soil and staining. Matted and glazed for viewing both recto and verso, within a gilt wood frame; not examined out of frame.

Goldman and Kinsberg,  Hebrew Printing in America, 1735-1926, New York, 2006, p. 1162-3; Shalom Sabar, Ketubbah: Jewish Marriage Contracts of the Hebrew Union College Skirball Museum and Klau Library, (New York, 1990) pp. 265-270.

the only known "pro forma" ketubbah created for the jews of the new world

The present lot is the only known example of a rare “pro-forma” ketubbah created for the nascent American Jewish community. In the absence of ordained clergy (Abraham Rice, who arrived in 1840, was the first), North American Jews required an exact model of how this important legal contract was to be written, with instructions as how to properly complete all relevant phrases (e.g. specific date, time and place, personal status of the bride, requisite amounts of dowry, etc …). 

The basic Aramaic text is written in a clear and lucid Sephardic semi-cursive Hebrew script, with blank spaces left to indicate where insertions, particular to each case, needed to be incorporated. The present document is printed on larger sized paper than was utilized for actual ketubbot, affording the scribe space to write several lines of instructions, mostly in Portuguese, but with relevant insertions in Hebrew and/or Aramaic, as necessary. As it turns out, the space on the front of the document was insufficient, and the lengthy instructional text was continued on the verso.

Traditionally, the first word of a ketubbah denotes the day of the week upon which the wedding takes place. This means that under normal circumstances, there are six variable entries (Sunday through Friday) which may be entered her. In this “pro-forma” ketubbah, however, the entry for Wednesday was already printed on the otherwise blank form, in advance of any manuscript text to be added later. This practice is known to us from some European exemplars of this ketubbah form and as noted by Professor Shalom Sabar, is a strong indication of the overwhelming preference among Sephardic Jews of the period to conduct weddings on Wednesdays. An early antecedent to this preference may be the Talmudic reference to Wednesdays being the favored day for the marriage of virgins (Mishnah Ketubbot, 1:1).   

The ketubbah border is based upon a ketubbah designed in Amsterdam in the late 1640s by the noted Italian Jewish artist Shalom d'Italia. The beauty of Shalom's drawn and engraved masterpieces engendered, in subsequent years, several engraved versions of the ketubbah borders seen here. These popular borders all shared the same basic elements: an arch supported by two columns entwined with floral wreaths; a pair of putti hold a cloth upon which is engraved the blessing “with a good sign;” the sides are filled with large vases, flanked by small pots containing Dutch tulips and other flowers, in which are nestled birds and insects. Two images appear in the top corners. In most versions, the image at right depicts a young couple dressed in elegant attire, representative of the bride and groom; on the left, a mother and children, the classical personification of the virtue of charity. Together, the two images symbolize the ideals of marriage and motherhood.

For more than two hundred years this border adorned Sephardic ketubbot, not only in Amsterdam, but in the European Sephardic population centers of Hamburg, Bayonne, and London, as well as in the New World. Indeed, the two earliest surviving examples of North American decorated ketubbot, both commemorating marriages which took place in New York in 1751, were each scribed on versions of this decorative frame. But neither of those vastly important ketubbot could have been written without consulting the present document, written in 1738 to serve the nascent American Jewish community as a “model ketubbah.”

That this document was created for and used by the Jews who made up the oldest Jewish congregation in the New World, should be seen as one of the strongest existing pieces of evidence in our possession of their commitment and dedication to the venerable institutions of their faith.