NATIONAL LIBRARY OF THE CZECH REPUBLIC



SARAVALŮV ODKAZ
SARAVAL LEGACY
DZIEDZICTWO SARAVALA
מורשת סרוואל

The rare collection of Hebrew manuscripts and incunabula uniquely presented
before its handing over to the Government of Poland

The exhibition is held under the auspices of the Minister of Culture of the Czech Republic


November 9th - 17th 2004, 10 a.m. - 6 p.m.
Mirror Chapel of the Klementinum
National Library of the Czech Republic, Prague 1
 

The exhibition is a unique opportunity for the public to see a part of the Leon Vita Saraval (1771-1851) collection that was housed, until the World War II, in the Jewish Theological Seminary in Breslau (Wroclaw). Displayed here are thirty four Hebrew manuscripts and five incunabula - in six volumes - that formed probably the most valuable part of the Saraval collection and are unparalleled to any other collection on the territory of the Czech Republic.
The manuscripts and printed books on display span seven centuries, the oldest having been finished in 1284-85, the most recent one in 1833. They originated in various parts of Europe, North Africa and Middle East and include books written or printed on the territory of today´s Portugal and Spain, Algeria, Turkey, Italy, Germany and Poland. All the main scribal traditions are represented, the Sephardic (Spanish), Italian and Ashkenazic (German) with the main types and styles of Hebrew script and, also, several fine examples of book illumination. Incunabula from Spain, Portugal and Italy document the very beginnings of Hebrew printing, still under the strong influence of the hand written book.
The fate of Hebrew books and scribal traditions reflects the fate of their Jewish scribes or owners; as a result of political and historical changes they were often forced to migrate together from their homes to far away countries.The same is applied to the Saraval collection: from Trieste, where its collector had assembled it with love and care, it came in 1854 to Breslau (Wroclaw) where eminent Jewish scholars could study it until the World War II. Pillaged by the Nazis, it was dispersed all over the world and parts of the collection made their way into institutions in Warsaw, Moscow, Jerusalem, New York, or into private hands. One part of the collection was also moved to the Klementinum library in Prague. It was as late as 1980´s, when a brief list of the collection was made and books were made accessible to Czech Hebraists. Information on the fact, that a part of the collection comprising the most precious manuscripts from the 13th century has been discovered in Klementinum, met with a great response in our country and abroad as well. In the beginning of 1990´s, a brief catalogue was made by specialists from the Jewish National and University Library in Jerusalem. A detailed description of the collection has been made only recently by Olga Sixtova and Jerzy Stankiewicz from the Jewish Museum in Prague.
The collection will now be moving back to its previous hometown Breslau (Wroclaw). Besides its cataloguing in this year, the collection has also been digitized. In its digital form, that was generously finaced by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, the collection remains in Prague. Digitization was made and supported by the AiP Beroun Company. It became a part of a great project of digitization of historical documents called “Memoriae Mundi Series Bohemica” (briefly “Memoria”), which makes them electronically accessible to the public. The Memoria project was launched as early as 1992 as a part of the pilot Project for UNESCO. That was also the beginning of the cooperation between the National Library of the Czech Republic and the AiP Beroun Company. The first digitization workplace started its regular work on digitizing manuscripts and early printed books in 1996. This work was gradually developed into two National Programmes that were announced in 2000 under the names of Memoria and Kramerius (digitization of old newspapers). Dozens of various institutions participated in them. Thanks to a large volume of the work done and a complex conception, our programmes rank among the most important ones all over the world. Especially the Memoria Project has been gradually involving related initiatives from many other countries, e.g. Slovakia, Poland, Lithuania, Croatia, Germany, and Austria. Such cooperation creates a very interesting virtual environment, in which manuscripts, early printed books, and historical maps, that once belonged to each other or even came from the same collections and were dispersed throughout the world due to historical events, are now meeting again. The Memoria Project uses the newest technologies and digital formats, it communicates with similar systems in the world. At present, it makes accessible ca 650 000 pages from almost 1400 manuscripts and early printed books, being at the same time the union catalogue of historical collections of the participating institutions.
The Memoria Project thus makes it possible that the Saraval collection of Hebrew manuscripts and incunabula remains electronically accessible to scholars, researchers as well as to the public from all over the world.
 

Authors of the exhibition
Olga Sixtová, Jerzy Stankiewicz

Production
Exhibitions Department of the National Library
Jerzy Stankiewicz

Digitization and electronic access
AiP Beroun s.r.o.

Hebrew manuscripts

In the Middle ages, the Jews lived on all sides of the Mediterranean cost, in the Near East and in Western and Central Europe, and established, roughly speaking, three main socio-cultural groups. Sephardic Jews settled originally in Spain and countries under the Islamic rule. Ashkenazic Jews lived in the Christian countries North of Alps (Northern France, Germany, Bohemia, and later Poland etc.). The ancient Italian Jewish community formed an entity apart.
In each of these areas the Jews developed, together with local rites and customs, also a variety of Hebrew scripts. Thus we distinguish the sephardic, ashkenazic and Italian Hebrew scripts and scribal traditions which even bear resemblance to the local (Arabic or Latin) scripts and forms of visual decoration. With changing political circumstances (e.g. the expulsion of Jews from the Iberian peninsula at the end of the 15th century), the scripts often migrated together with their scribes to distant places. We find, for example, many sephardic, as well as ashkenazic, manuscripts written or completed in Italy. Consequently, speaking of a “sephardic” manuscript refers rather to its script than to the geographical area of Sefarad (Hebr. Spain).
Manuscripts were produced mostly by professional scribes. Some were famous like Abraham Farissol, who fled from Provence to Italy, or Joel ben Simon, who traveled over Germany and North Italy. Many are less known, but still interesting, like the scribe of the Pentateuch (F 47406, no 34 of this exhibition), whose family apparently came from the Bohemian town of Cheb (Eger), although the manuscript he signed was completed by an Italian scribe. Among Hebrew scribes we also find women and children, however exceptionally. At the end of the 13th century Paula, daughter of Abraham, made her living as scribe in Rome. She was descendant of a family of scribes and scholars, among them the famous Rabbi Nathan ben Jehiel.
Such intriguing details we learn from the colophons, i.e. short notes placed usually at the end of the manuscript (though not in every manuscript there was a colophon and many were lost together with the last page of the book). Colophons generally include scribe’s name, title of the work, date and place of the completion of his work, name of the patron who ordered the copy or whether the scribe copied it for himself. At the very end, blessings for the patron and for the copyist are expressed. Personal statements are rare, but all the more fascinating.
As to the contents, Hebrew manuscripts covered a vast spectrum of subjects from Bibles and biblical commentaries, prayer books, Talmud and rabbinical literature, to mystical tracts of Kabbalah and works on philosophy, grammar, astronomy, medicine, mathematics and poetry.
The content of the manuscript determined the type of script used by the scribe. The square script was used for the Bible, the Talmud, prayers books and formal documents, semi-cursive script for most of other texts (commentaries, treatises on various subjects etc.) and cursive script for personal notes, letters etc. The sanctity or importance of the text, together with the wishes and the wealth of the patron, influenced also the quality of the material on which the manuscript was written and its decoration. An important role in the ornamentation or illumination of the book was played by the artistic traditions of the place and time (e.g. absence of figurative depictions in the manuscripts made in Islamic countries). One of the pecularities of Hebrew manuscripts in all the above mentioned areas is the micrography, i.e. minute script used for ornamental decoration. Generally located on the margins, it takes the text of the commentary or scribal notes (the massorah for the biblical text) and shapes them into geometrical, animal, vegetal or human forms.
It has been estimated that at the beginning of 14th century there were about 200 000 - 300 000 of Hebrew manuscripts in existence in Europe. From these not more than four to five thousand are still extant today, mainly thanks to the efforts and love of collectors such as Leon Vita Saraval.

Next pictures on www.memoria.cz

Hebrew incunabula

Among the incunabula, books printed before 1500, we find about 175 editions printed in Hebrew characters. Probably the first Hebrew printing press was established around year 1470 in Rome by Obadiah, Manasseh and Benjamin of Rome.
From Rome, Hebrew printing spread over Italy and Hebrew presses were established in Reggio di Calabria, Piove di Sacco, Mantua, Ferrara, Bologna, Soncino, Naples, Brescia, Barco and perhaps in other places unknown to us today.
Independently of the Italian centre, Hebrew printing started in Spain and Portugal with the publication of Rashi’s Perush ha-Torah by Solomon Alkabez in Guadalajara in 1476. Followed the presses established in Hijar, Faro, Lisboa, Zamora and Leiria. Expulsion of Jews from Iberian Peninsula, at the end of the 15th century, ceased the Sephardic Hebrew printing in its home land, but did not put it to a complete end. It moved on to wherever Sephardic Jews settled, to Turkey, North Africa, and in various places in Europe.
Because of scarcity of paper and difficulties connected with the printing technology, incunabula editions were in general very modest in number of copies. The book of Psalms with commentary by Rabbi David Kimhi (Radak) published by Joseph, Hayyim Mordecai and Hezekiah Montero in Bologna in 1477 was printed in 300 copies; Radak’s commentary on the Later Prophets published in 1482 in Guadalajara by Solomon ibn Alkabez reached 400 copiesIn the incunabula period, books of practically all genres of Hebrew literature were published, some titles in more than one edition, by different printers in different places. On display here are two different editions of Rambam’s Mishne Torah. In their appearance early incunabula follow manuscript scribal traditions: blank title page, space left out for initial words to be executed later by the illuminator or ornamented frames etc. Only sometimes at the end of the text, in the colophon, some information is given about the printer (printers), scholarly or technical staff, and place and date of printing. The type used by early Hebrew printers was modelled after Hebrew handwritten scripts. For the Hebrew printing in Sephardic lands it was natural to use Sephardic type of script, and even in Italy, the Sephardic model prevailed for various reasons. The Hebrew incunabula from the collection of Leon Vita Saraval on display here belong to the finest examples of their kind.