(RaDa”K). Sepher Michlol [grammar]

KIMCHI, DAVID

Gershom Soncino

Constantinople

1534

Third edition (the first two editions entirely unknown to Steinschneider). Title within attractive four-part ornamental border. Printed in double columns. On title, inscription of former owner: “London Apr. 28, Year 1762 by Mardochai Odeiro”

Vinograd, Const. 149; Yaari, Const. 118; Mehlman 1252; Adams K-48

According to the title-page, the printing was begun by Gershom Soncino, an expatriate from Italy to Turkey "in the twelfth year of H.M. Sultan Suleiman." Unfortunately, the elder Soncino did not live to see the entire book in print. In the colophon, we are told that the work was completed by Gershom's son Eliezer. The title is the source of invaluable genealogical information concerning the Soncino family (originally from Fürth, Germany). Gershom Soncino tells of the lengths he went in order to obtain the Tocques recension of the Tosaphoth for his edition of the Talmud - traveling as far as France, Cambri [Cambridge?] and Geneva - only to have his edition duplicated by the Venetian printers (i.e. Daniel Bomberg). Concluding on a touching note, Gershom asks that God provide him succor in old age in the merit of his relief work on behalf of those Jews driven from Spain and Portugal. See A.M. Haberman, Perakim be-Toldoth ha-Madpissim ha-Ivrim (1978), pp. 15-20; EJ, Vol. XV, cols. 140-42