MAHARIL (ASHKENAZIC CUSTUMAL), RABBI ZALMAN OF SANKT GOAR, LUBLIN: KALONYMUS BEN MORDECHAI JAFFE, 1590

An unusually rare copy of the fourth edition of Maharil, with distinguished Anglo-Jewish provenance.

The text of this edition of Rabbi Zalman of Sankt Goar’s (ca. 1390-ca. 1472) classic Ashkenazic custom collection, Maharil, named for his teacher Rabbi Jacob ha-Levi Moellin (ca. 1360-1427), is based on the version published in Cremona in 1558. According to bibliophile and bibliographer Ephraim Deinard (1846-1930), copies of this imprint are actually rarer than those of the editio princeps printed in Sabbioneta in 1556 (see lot 26). The present, well-preserved copy comes from the collection of Josef Hirsch Dunner (1913-2007), head of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations in London and rabbi of the city’s Adath Yisroel Synagogue.