Tractate Shabbath.

(TALMUD, BABYLONIAN).

Orient

11th century

Hebrew manuscript written in square Oriental type on vellum. Two leaves (four pages) 44-46 lines per page composed in a single column. Corresponds to the published Talmud text of ff. 30r-32v (as per the Vilna foliation). The David Solomon Sassoon copy.

ONE OF THE EARLIEST EXTANT TALMUD MANUSCRIPTS. A FRAGMENT DISCOVERED IN THE CAIRO GENIZAH. CONTAINS MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED TEXTUAL VARIANTS. According to Igereth Rav Sherira Gaon, the Talmud was orally preserved exclusively, and it was only in the 10th century was it seen fit to record the text in written form. Accordingly, this Talmud fragment is among the very first texts to have ever appeared. In particular, this represents the earliest extant text that focuses upon the laws and observances of the Sabbath, a concept utterly sacrosanct to the traditions of the Jewish people, uniquely prese rving them through the millennia in both time and in space. See D.S. Sassoon, Ohel Dawid: Descriptive Catalogue of the Hebrew and Samaritan Manuscripts in the Sassoon Library (London, 1932), Vol. I no. 521. Provenance: Sotheby Parke Bernet, The Collection of David Solomon Sassoon, 12th May, 1981, lot 34. Sotheby’s, Property from the Silberstein-Boesky Foundation, 3rd December, 2004, lot 3.