The History of the Rites, Customes, and Manner of Life of the Present Jews throughout the World

AUCTION 51 | Thursday, June 23rd, 2011 at 1:00

Fine Judaica: Printed Books, Manuscripts Graphic & Ceremonial Art Including: The Alfonso Cassuto Collection of Iberian Books, Part II

Back to Catalogue Download Catalogue

<Previous Lot

/395

Next Lot>

Lot 258

MODENA, LEON

The History of the Rites, Customes, and Manner of Life of the Present Jews throughout the World

FIRST ENGLISH EDITION. English interspersed with Hebrew pp. (46),1-80, 91-249, (1 blank). Title and a few other leaves remargined, browned. Modern boards. 12mo Roth, Magna Bibliotheca Anglo-Judaica, p. 391, no. 6

London: J.L. 1650

Est: $1,200 - $1,800

PRICE REALIZED $1,000

The first publication written by a Jew in modern times, outlining the practices of Judaism for a Gentile readership. First published in Italian under the title Historia de gli riti Hebraici (Paris, 1637) at the request of Sir Henry Wotton, English Ambassador to Venice, for presentation to King James I. See C. Roth, "Leon da Modena and His English Correspondents," TJHSE, Vol. 17 (1951-1952), pp. 40-41; C. Roth, "Leone da Modena and England" in: Studies in Books and Booklore (1972) pp. 203-4; M.R. Cohen, The Autobiography of a Seventeenth-Century Venetian Rabbi: Leon Modena's Life of Judah (1988), p. 256, n.1; Dorit Raines, "Judaism in the Eyes of the Venetian Patriciate in the Time of Leon Modena" (Hebrew) in D. Malkiel (Ed.), The Lion Shall Roar: Leon Modena and His World (2003) pp. 19-20