A Mid-Seventeenth-Century Manuscript of the (Unpublished) Hebrew Grammars of Menasseh ben Israel and Isaac Aboab da Fonseca Recovered
Adri K. Offenberg Adri K
The combination of the paper evidence and the provenance data can lead to the following conclusion. The manuscript was most probably copied about 1655/60 or a few years later, during the lifetime of Isaac Aboab da Fonseca, the first rabbi in the New World, and...
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M. Kayserling used this catalogue in his Biblioteca Española-Portugueza-Judaica (Strasbourg 1890, reprinted 1971).

There is a copy in the Bibliotheek van de Koninklijke Vereeniging van de Belangen des Boekhandels (BKVB) in Amsterdam, press mark N.v. 837; cf. S. Shunami, Bibliography of Jewish bibliographies. Reprint of 1965 edition with corrections (Jerusalem 1969) no. 293.

Cf. J.W. Wesselius, ‘I don’t know whether he will stay for long. Isaac Abendana’s early years in England and his Latin translation of the Mishnah’, Studia Rosenthaliana 22 (1988) 92, n. 40.

J.W. Wesselius, ‘De briefwisseling tussen Johann Christoffer Wolf en Willem Surenhuisen (1720–1727)’, Studia Rosenthaliana 26 (1992) 136–148.

Chancery Quarto. 205×147 mm. Collational formula: I2 II17 III8 IV5 V4 VI6: 84 leaves.

L. Fuks and R.G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Hebrew and Judaic manuscripts in Amsterdam public collections. II. Catalogue of the manuscripts of Ets Haim / Livraria Montezinos, Sephardic Community of Amsterdam (Leiden 1975) no. 326.

L. Fuks and R.G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Hebrew and Judaic manuscripts, nos 328 and 429.

E. Heawood, Watermarks, mainly of the 17th and 18th centuries (Amsterdam 1969 2).

Likhachev’s watermarks. An English language version, ed. by J.S.G. Simmons (Amsterdam 1994).

O. Valls I Subirà, Paper and watermarks in Catalonia / El papel y sus filigranas en Catalunya. Ed. and transl. from the Spanish by J.S.G. Simmons (Amsterdam 1970).

L. Wiener, Etude sur les filigraines des papiers lorrains (Nancy 1893).

D. Verdooner and H. Snel, Trouwen in Mokum 1598–1811 / Jewish marriage in Amsterdam (’s-Gravenhage 1991) II, Index 14, 620.

L. Fuks and R.G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Hebrew and Judaic manuscripts II, no. 386.

Cf. M. Steinschneider, Catalogus librorum hebraeorum in Bibliotheca Bodleiana (Berolini 1852–1860) (reprinted 1931, 1964, 1999) col. 2926.

J.C. Wolfius, Bibliotheca Hebraea III (Hamburg 1727) 708.

M. Steinschneider, Catalogus, col. 1645.

For an extensive analysis of the grammar see A.J. Kleinsmit, ‘Amsterdam Sephardim and Hebrew grammar in the seventeenth century’ Studia Rosenthaliana 22 (1988) 144–164 esp. 145–153.

J. Meijer, Encyclopaedia Sefardica Neerlandica II (Amsterdam 5710 [1950]) 44 (with illustration of the title page) 46.

D.F. Mendes, Memorias do estabelecimento e progresso dos Judeos Portuguezes e Espanhoes nesta famosa citade de Amsterdam. A Portuguese chronicle of the history of the Sephardim in Amsterdam up to 1772. Ed. with introd. and annotations by L. Fuks and R.G. Fuks-Mansfeld and a philological commentary, analysis and glossaries by B.N. Teensma (Assen 1975) 26 and 156, n. 64.

D. Henriques de Castro Mz., Keur van grafstenen op de Portugees-Isra ëlietische begraafplaats te Ouderkerk aan de Amstel met beschrijving en biografische aantekeningen. Met platen /Selected gravestones from the Dutch Portuguese Jewish cemetery at Ouderkerk aan de Amstel with descriptions and biographical notes. With plates. A photographic reprint of the Dutch German edition (1883) preceded by an English translation of the original, additional descriptions of six gravestones and by introductory and bibliographical contributions (Ouderkerk aan de Amstel 1999) 39–42.

J.S. da Silva Rosa, ‘Ietsoverden Amsterdamschen Opperrabbijn Isaäc Aboab’, Centraalblad voor Israelieten in Nederland 29 (1913) nos 39-41 (list of Aboab’s works, no. 2); A. Wiznitzer, ‘The minute book of congregations Zur Israel of Recife and Magen Abraham of Mauricia, Braziľ, Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society 42 (1953) 217–302; idem, Jews in colonial Brazil (New York 1960) 169.

I.S. Emmanuel, ‘Jewish education in Curaçao (1692–1802)’, Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society 44 (1954/55) 215–216; idem, ‘Fortunes and misfortunes of the Jews in Brazil (1630–1654)’, American Jewish Archives 7 (1955) 5 and no. 12; the full text of this resolution was published by W.Chr. Pieterse in her doctoral thesis Daniel Levi de Barrios als geschiedschrijver van de Portugees-Israelietische Gemeente te Amsterdam in zijn ‘Triumpho del govierno popular’ (Amsterdam 1968) 168. She also arrived at the conclusion (p. 71f.) that Aboab went to Brazil in 1641.