Sepher Rav Mordechai. With commentary by Menachem David of Tiktin (entitled Mahara”m)

AUCTION 36 | Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 at 1:00
Fine Judaica: Printed Books & Manuscripts

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Lot 156
MORDECHAI BEN HILLEL HAKOHEN

Sepher Rav Mordechai. With commentary by Menachem David of Tiktin (entitled Mahara”m)

SECOND sEPARATE EDITION. First Edition of Commentary. Former owner’s signature on title ff. 191. Signature 7.3-7.8 were issued out of sequence by the printer. Dampstained. Contemporary vellum over thick wooden boards, corner-pieces (one lacking), clasps and hinges. Folio Vinograd, Cracow 209

Cracow : Isaac Prostitz 1598

Est: $5,000 - $6,000
PRICE REALIZED $8,500
The Mordechai is a great repository of Aschkenazic or German Halacha, in which over 300 books and authors are cited, most notably the responsa of Rabbi Meir of Rothenburg. The author, Mordechai ben Hillel Hakohen (1240?-1298) was a brother-in-law of R. Meir Hakohen, author of Hagahoth Maimoniyoth, an Aschkenazic gloss to Maimonides’ Code, and an outstanding disciple of R. Meir ben Baruch of Rothenburg. Together with his wife and five children, Mordechai was killed in the Rindfleisch Massacres in Nuremburg. (See EJ, Vol. XII, cols. 311-314). Most of our Mahara”m commentary has been incorporated into the Chidushei Anshei Shem found in the standard Vilna edition of the Talmud, under the rubric “Mahara”m Tiktin.” However, the present first edition of the commentary, contains a number of responsa (viz. verso of title and f. 61b-62a), as well as an introductory essay by the exegete’s son Asher, left out of the subsequent editions