Anonymous (Carlo Alfano?). Il Sabathai, o vero, Il finto Messia degli hebrei, che nell`anno 1666 si dichiarò Maumettano in Costantinopoli.

AUCTION 76 | Thursday, June 14th, 2018 at 3:00 PM
Fine Judaica: Printed Books, Manuscripts, Autograph Letters, Ceremonial & Graphic Art

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Lot 245
(SABBATIANISM)

Anonymous (Carlo Alfano?). Il Sabathai, o vero, Il finto Messia degli hebrei, che nell`anno 1666 si dichiarò Maumettano in Costantinopoli.

Second edition. Text in Italian. pp. 60. Lightly browned and stained, previous owner’s marks, pp. 37-38 torn affecting text of upper eight lines. Later vellum. 16mo. Not in WorldCat.

Viterbo: Gio. Francesco Paci, 1671. 1671

Est: $5,000 - $7,000
PRICE REALIZED $4,500
Exceptionally rare, possibly a unicum. Only two copies of the first edition (c. 1669) are recorded. An important and detailed biography, written in his lifetime, of the False Messiah Shabthai Tzvi (1626-76), from his birth through his conversion to Islam. The anonymous author, possibly an Italian diplomat, completed this report in Constantinople and sent it to his Italian correspondent on 16th December, 1666. <<A rare and valuable source on the history of Shabthai Tzvi.>> Gershom Scholem tried unsuccessfully to locate this work: “So far, I have not been able to examine a copy” see Sabbatai Sevi: The Mystical Messiah” (1975) p. 763.