YIDDISH MANUSCRIPTS IN THE BRITISH LIBRARY

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used the term 'Hebrew-German'. On the transition from Yiddish to German among German Jewry, see Paul Wexler, 'Ashkenazic German, 1760-1895', International Journal of the Sociology! of Language, xxx (1981), pp. ii9-3O> and Steven M. Lowenstein, 'The Yiddish Written Word in Nineteenth-Century Germany', in his The Mechanics of Ghange: Essays in the Social History of German Jewry (Atlanta, 1992), pp. 183-99. 27 The first reference work to mention a British Library Yiddish manuscript, the 1931 Berlin Encyclopaedia Judaica, vol. vii, col. 946, cites this work as an example of the 'gemischte hebr.-jidd. H.' (mixed Hebrew-Yiddish manuscripts), noting that Yiddish manuscripts are listed among Hebrew ones in the various catalogues, though Neubauer provides a separate index. 28 Most notably Werner Weinberg, who makes a distinction between 'Juedisch-Deutsch' { = 'Judaeo-German') and Yiddish; see his Die Reste des Juedisch-Deutschen (Stuttgart, 1969; 1973)- 29 The undated colophon is quoted in full by Margoliouth. The date 1590 given by Habersaat, in his ' Repertorium der Jiddischen Handschriften: ir, Rivista degli studi orientali, xxx (1955), p. 248, and in his 'Beitrag zur Chronologie der datierten jiddischen Handschriften', Mitteilungen aus dem Arbeitskreisfur Jiddisttk, ii, no. 18 {1963), p. 118, is part of an owner's note on f. 2, not of the text. The manuscript's watermark is an armillary sphere with a countermark consisting of the letters SRP; cf. Briquet no. 13989, a Venetian paper dated 1558. This watermark was produced only during the 1550s. {For our account of this manuscript, the writers are indebted entirely to Dr Eva Frojmovic of the Warburg Institute, London, who is currently preparing a detailed study of the manuscript and its decoration.) 30 Among the known illuminated, decorated, or illustrated manuscripts in Jewish languages, other than Yiddish, are texts in Aramaic, Judaeo- Arabic, Judaeo-Proven^al, Judaeo-Italian, Judaeo-Spanish, and Judaeo-Greek. A very early decorated manuscript in Judaeo-Arabic, held in the India Office Library in the British Library, is described by Y. T. Langermann in this issue of the British Library Journal. Judaeo-Persian manuscript art, including miniatures in the British Library, has been studied by Vera Basch Moreen, Miniature Paintings in Judaeo-Persian Manuscripts (Cincinnati, 1985). A unique colourillustrated manuscript in Urdu in Hebrew characters is held in the British Library, Or. MS. 13287. An illustrated magical text partly in Latin in Hebrew characters, held in the Austrian Nationalbibliothek in Vienna, has been described by Raphael Loewe,' A Mediaeval Latin-German Magical Text in Hebrew Characters', in A. Rapoport-Albert and S. J. Zipperstein {eds.), Jewish History: essays in honour of Ghimen Abramsky {London, 1988), pp. 345-68. 31 In his unpublished typescript Yiddish Manuscripts m England, Habersaat cites only nine items from Margoliouth's catalogue, somehow omitting two extraordinary hagadot where the Yiddish may be quantitatively minor, but is nonetheless most significant. Habersaat cites Margoliouth nos. 102, 244, 651, 679, 683, 684, 874, 981 and 1049, overlooking nos. 6n (Add. MS. 18724) and 612 (Sloane MS. 3173), as well as the Yiddish satirical verses in no. 925 (Add. MS. 27045B). 32 On this manuscript, see Iris Fishof, 'Yakob Sofer mi-Berlin: A Portrait of a Jewish Scribe', Israel Museum Journal, vi {1987), pp. 83-94, a^d E. G. L. Schrijver, 'Be-6tiyy6t Amsterdam: Eighteenth-century Hebrew manuscript production in Central Europe: the case of Jacob ben Judah Leib Shamas', Quaerendo, xx (Leiden, 1990), pp. 24-62. On eighteenth-century Hebrew manuscript decoration, see Cecil Roth, 'Illuminated Manuscripts, Hebrew: Post-Medieval Illumination', Encyclopaedia Judaicd {Jerusalem, 1972), vol. viii, col. 1287; Ernest M. Namenyi, 'La Miniature juive au XVIIe et au XVIIIe siecle'. Revue des etudes juives, cxvi (Paris, 1957), pp. 29-71; idem, *The Illumination of Hebrew Manuscripts after the Invention of Printing', in Cecil Roth {td.), Jewish Art, revised edn., ed. B. Narkiss {London, 1971), pp. 149-62; M. Schmelzer, 'Decorated Hebrew Manuscripts of the Eighteenth Century in the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America', in R. Dan (ed.), Occident and Orient: A Tribute to the memory of A. Scheiber (Budapest/Leiden, 1988), pp. 331-51; [H. Peled-Carmeli], Illustrated Haggadot of the Eighteenth Gentury, ed. Y. Fischer (Jerusalem, 1983); and I. Fishof, The Hamburg-Altona School of Hebrew Illuminated Manuscripts of the First Half of the Eighteenth Gentury, Ph.D. 102
thesis. The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 1992. A comprehensive bibliographic survey of this material by E. G. L. Schrijver, Repertorium of Decorated Hebrew Manuscripts of the Eighteenth Century, is now in preparation in collaboration with the Dutch Academy. 33 For brief palaeographic notes on this manuscript, and a facsimile of the folio containing Almekhtiger got in Yiddish, see S. Birnbaum, The Hebrew Scripts, no. 382. 34 Strangely, the generally observant Margoliouth merely writes that the Leipnik Haggadah is very much on the same principle as that executed by Jacob of Berlin, excepting that it is 'on a much larger scale, and... contains different and more illuminations'. It is curious that Margoliouth devotes over one and a half folio columns to Add. MS. 18724 (Margoliouth no. 611), and less than half a folio column to Sloane MS. 3173 (Margohouth no. 612), both of them written in the same year, 1740. Ironically, someone has lightly pencilled on the frontispiece of Add. MS. 18724: 'See another and finer copy of this work in MS. Sloane 3173.' 35 On the Yiddish versions of these songs, see J. Baumgarten, Introduction a la litterature yiddish ancienne, pp. 323-7, and further literature cited there. See in particular Ch. Shmeruk, 'The Earliest Aramaic and Yiddish version of the Song of the Kid (Khad Gadye)', in U. Weinreich (ed.). The Field of Yiddish (New York, 1954), pp. 214-18; D. Sadan, 'Boy dayn tempi shiroh', in his Kheyn-gribelekh (tsu der biografye fun vort un ufr^/) (Buenos Aires, I97i),pp. 115-20; and now H. Troger, 'Ein Siddur der Universitatsbibliothek Rostock und Varianten des Liedes Almechtiger Got im Italien des 16. Jahrhunderts', Jiddistik-Mitteilungen, no. 13 (Trier, Apr. 1995), pp. i-ii. 36 On the Leipnik Haggadah in the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana, Amsterdam, see L. Fuks and R. G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Hebrew and Judaic Manuscripts in Amsterdam Public Collections, vol. i (Leiden, 1973), p. 65, no. 130; E. G. L. Schrijver, 'The Rosenthaliana Leipnik Hagaddah', in Passover Haggadah, Altona, Germany, 1738, Scribe/Illustrator: Joseph ben David of Leipnik: Collection of the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana, Amsterdam, Hs. Ros. ^82, Facsimile Edition (Tel Aviv: Turnowsky, 1987); and I. Fishof, 'The Rosenthaliana Leipnik Haggadah', in A. K. Offenberg et al. (eds.), Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana: Treasures of Jewish Booklore (Amsterdam, 1994), pp. 72-3, no. 31. 37 See the handwritten notes by Dr Joseph Rosenwasser, in the bound volume Register of Oriental MSS. and Hebrew MSS. Acquisitions, ^945^^990 [with indications of provenance], maintained in the Hebrew Section. The manuscript was purchased at the Christie's sale, 9 Dec. 1965. There are at least a dozen illustrated manuscripts ofPerek Shirah, all of the eighteenth century. One of these (Jewish National and University Library, Jerusalem, Heb 8''4295) has been reproduced in facsimile with introductory notes by Malachi Beit-Arie (Tel Aviv: Turnowsky). More recently, another manuscript was described, with accompanying plates, in the Sotheby's sale catalogue of Western Manuscripts and Miniatures (London, 5 Dec. 1994), lot no. 72. On the Perek Shirah and its manuscripts, see the doctoral dissertation by M. Beit-Arie (Hebrew University, Jerusalem), and his forthcoming study on this subject. 38 The original collection of prayers, entitled Likute Tsevi, compiled by the printer Tsevi Hirsh b. Hayim of Flirth, was first published in Wilhermsdorf in 1738, and reprinted many times. See Ch. B. Friedberg, Bet Eked Sefarim [Bibliographical Lexicon of the rphole Hebrew and Jewish-German literature'] (Tel Aviv, 1951), vol. i, p. 515, no. 645, and the more definitive bibliography by M. N. Rosenfeld, in 'Zebi Hirsch ben Chaim aus Fiirth: Autor und Buchdrucker', Nachrichten fiir den judischen Burger Furths (Sept. 1991), pp. 34-40. A Yiddish edition of Likute Tsevi was published in Warsaw in 1872. 39 On this work, see the entry ' Orhot Zaddikim', in Encyclopaedia Judaica (Jerusalem, 1972), vol. xii, cols. 1458-60. On the Yiddish version, see Baumgarten, Introduction a la litterature yiddish anctenne, pp. 264-71, and index (s.v. ''Seyfer mides'), and Weinreich, Shtaplen: fir etyudn tsu der yidisher shprakh-visnshaft un literatur-ges~ hikhte (Berlin, 1923), p. 104. 40 See Margoliouth, vol. iii, pp. 169-70. Margoljouth noted that another early manuscript of the Yiddish text is in Cambridge University Library, from the collection formerly belonging to Dr Charles Taylor. 41 It is not unusual for a work to be known by several names. In Or. MS. 10086 the title is 'Amude ha-'olam and in Or. MS. 10668 it is 103
Page 1 and 2: YIDDISH MANUSCRIPTS IN THE BRITISH
Page 3 and 4: BIBLE AND HOMILETICS The earliest r
Page 5 and 6: no. 1049]), to which attention will
Page 7 and 8: ;^. /. Decorated title-page of the
Page 9 and 10: GRAMMAR AND LEXICOGRAPHY The Gaster
Page 11 and 12: PLATE III Opening of the penitentia
Page 13 and 14: certain importance in the Gaster Co
Page 15 and 16: Horowitz's Shol hameylekh: a biblis
Page 17 and 18: Or. 9999 Gaster ^ Or. ioooo Gaster
Page 19 and 20: (ed.), The Field of Yiddish: Studie
Page 21 and 22: Judischer Sprach-Meister, oder Hebr
Page 23: succession of Museum and Library cu
Page 27 and 28: appears to have been widely perceiv
Page 29 and 30: written either in Hebrew, which peo

YIDDISH MANUSCRIPTS IN THE BRITISH LIBRARY

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