Hagadah shel Pesach. With commentary by Isaac Abrabanel

(HAGADAH).

Asher Anshel & Partners

Amsterdam

1695

Additional engraved title depicting large figures of Moses and Aaron beneath six circular vignettes of Biblical themes. Numerous engraved copper-plate illustrations within the text. FINE FOLDING ENGRAVED HEBREW MAP OF THE HOLY LAND indicating the travels in the Wilderness and the division of the Land among the Tribes of Israel. All accomplished by the proselyte Abraham ben Jacob

Yudlov 93; Yaari 59; Yerushalmi 59-62

The First hagadah illustrated with copperplate engravings. Despite a few minor flaws, a suprisingly clean copy. “While the Four Sons had been a traditional subject for Hagadah illustration, they had always appeared separately. In the Amsterdam 1695 Hagadah they are shown together for the first time. This was Abraham ben Jacob’s essential contribution to the pictorial development of the theme...In this form and in this grouping, the Four Sons were henceforth to appear in countless Hagadahs down to the present day.” “It is somewhat ironic that these illustrations which were destined to be copied and imitated more than any Hagadah in history, were themselves borrowed from a Christian source: the biblical engravings published by the Swiss artist Matthaeus Merian in 1625-30...Most of the pictures were copied almost slavishly from Merian. Others were somewhat altered and rearranged to suit the Hagadah text, and were necessarily “Judaized” in the process.” Yerushalmi, pls.59-60