Itinerarium Beniamini Tudelensis [Travels of Benjamin of Tudela]. Translated from Hebrew into Latin by Benedictus Aria Montano.

BENJAMIN OF TUDELA.

Christopher Plantin

Antwerp

1575

FIRST LATIN EDITION. Printer’s device on title. Annotated throughout.

Adams B-670.

The author set forth in 1159 from Tudela, Spain, to travel to the Holy Land, crossing France, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria and Lebanon to get there. He then continued eastwards, reaching Iraq and later Persia; his description of the ruins of Nineveh is one of the oldest reliable sources extant. Returning to Spain, Benjamin passed through Egypt and North Africa. He lingered wherever he traveled, and noted the manners and commerce of the various communities he came in contact with. Benjamin made detailed reports of the political situation of his fellow Jews, surveying the activities of communal organizations and supplying the names of the principal Jews of each city visited. Probably no account - Jewish or Gentile - of the Mediterranean and the Middle East in this period, can equal the level of detail provided by Benjamin of Tudela.