Chibur Yaffe Mehayeshua [fables and parables]

AUCTION 72 | Thursday, March 16th, 2017 at 1:00

Fine Judaica: Printed Books, Manuscripts, Autograph Letters, Holy Land Maps & Fine Art

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Lot 189

NISSIM BAR YA’AKOV OF KAIROUAN.

Chibur Yaffe Mehayeshua [fables and parables]

Second edition. Title within a typographical border ff. 40. Lightly browned and stained, previous owners signatures. Contemporary calf, broken. Sm. 8vo. Vinograd, Amsterdam 1591

Amsterdam: Hertz Levi Rophe & son-in-law 1746

Est: $300 - $500

This collection of folktales, designed to strengthen faith, is likely the first prose work in medieval Hebrew literature - so paving the way for the Hebrew belletristic form as a literary genre. Stemming from the Tunisian city of Kairouan, the author was one of the outstanding leaders of North African Jewry flourishing in the first half of the 11th century. See M. Gaster, The Exampla of the Rabbis (1968); and EJ, Vol. XII cols. 1183-4.