(LITURGY).

SCARCE COPY WITH VARIANT TITLE PAGE MENTIONING THREE COMMUNITIES. Abraham Monteil, editor of this prayer book, was a native of L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, smallest of “the four holy communities” of Comtat Venaissin, the papal territory in Southern France that historically provided a safe haven for Jews fleeing the provinces of Languedoc and Provence, from whence they were expelled by the French monarchs. (The other three communities were: Avignon, Carpentras, and Cavaillon.) The Jews of the Comtat had their own synagogue rite, which Cecil Roth notes to be “of very considerable historical and literary interest.” According to Roth (see p. 85 in his Studies in Books and Booklore cited below), the title page on this copy which also mentions L'isle and Cavaillon is a rare variant of which only a small number of copies were published (not cited by Vinograd). See C.Roth, “The Liturgy of Avignon and the Comtat Venaissin,” Journal of Jewish Bibliography I (1939) p. 99-105; reprinted in Cecil Roth, Studies in Books and Booklore (1972), pp. 81-87; EJ, Vol. V, cols. 208, 859; Vol. IX, col.105; Vol. XI, col. 402