Metzalin Le’Atzirath Geshamim.

(LITURGY).

(Italy)

1613

Manuscript in Hebrew, written in a neat Italian semi-cursive hand. Final page in Italian, dated.

Prayer composed by the Provençal Hebrew poet Saul Caspi, and recited during a time of drought or to halt flooding rains. This prayer-poem, Eshpoch KaYam Mei Dema’oth is intense. It opens with the stanza: (“Tears pour like the sea/ Clad in horrors and fears/ Innumerable evils have encircled me/ Will the Lord perhaps act?”). The compositions by Saul Caspi (c. 1600) are included in various siddurim such as the Italian rite Seder HaTephillah (Mantua, 1676) and Seder Le’Arba Tzomoth KeMinhag Carpentras (Amsterdam, 1762). See Israel Davidson, Otzar HaShirah VehaPiyut Vol. I, p. 369, no. 8148.