רוח חן - אוניברסיטת בן-גוריון בנגב

iv
Scientific study among Jews on Ashkenazi soil and Karaites living in
Byzantium, Eastern Europe and Crimea depended mostly on texts which were
written in Hebrew or translated into Hebrew in Southern France or Italy.
Through this network of influence and cultural transfer, Rua˙ Óen and its
perception as a highly-valued introductory text for Aristotelian sciences were
passed on. The spreading of this image of Rua˙ Óen was a seminal factor that
led to the fact that the study of Rua˙ Óen persisted throughout these cultural
regions.
Rua˙ Óen was brought to Ashkenaz in the second half of the fourteenth
century at the latest, ostensibly from Italy. Shortly after, it was used by
Ashkenazi scholars who sought to acquire basic Aristotelian scientific
knowledge. By the sixteenth century its readership in the Ashkenazi cultural
context increased, and local printed editions were published. During this entire
period Rua˙ Óen played an essential role - at times an exclusive one - in
Ashkenazi readers' acquisition of Aristotelian science.
Rua˙ Óen gained particular popularity in the Karaite cultural contexts.
During most of the period under discussion, the Karaites read hand-written
copies of Rua˙ Óen. Manuscripts of the text had reached the Karaites in
Byzantium already by the thirteenth century, via their Rabbanite neighbors,
among whom the text had been popular between the thirteenth and fifteenth
centuries. The manuscripts of Rua˙ Óen which were disseminated in these
communities included distinctive additions, (e.g. poems, albeit not new
scientific material) and paratexts that are almost never in manuscripts copied
outside of the eastern Mediterranean Basin. From this Byzantine rabbinical
branch of Rua˙ Óen manuscripts, a Karaite branch emerged. From the
beginning of the seventeenth century, at the very latest, and throughout the
following two centuries, many manuscripts of Rua˙ Óen circulated in the East-
European and Crimean communities. Manuscripts of the text reached these