Mishneh Torah, Moses Maimonides, Scribe: Joseph ben Joshua ben Joseph ben Siman-Tov, Kashan (Persia): 1493

322 leaves (14 1/2 x 10 1/4 in.; 370 x 260 mm). Mishpatim and Korbanot complete; Taharah, nearly complete; Nezikin, Zeraim, Avodah, Kinyan, and Shoftim incomplete. Colophons to Mishpatim, Korbanot, Avodah, and Kinyan. Most leaves disbound; Sections of wide margins excised in a great many leaves, though with care taken to spare the text. Edges ragged. Frequent instances of heavy soiling and staining as well as accretions causing adhesions between leaves; some leaves survive only as fragments; others with text affected by tears or holes. Marginal notes. Scant remnants of early parchment over pasteboard and cloth, nearly entirely perished.

THE EARLIEST HEBREW MANUSCRIPT WRITTEN IN KASHAN AND THE EARLIEST KNOWN COPY OF THE MISHNEH TORAH WRITTEN IN PERSIA

The present lot comprises most of the second half of Maimonides’ halakhic magnum opus, which he named Yad ha-Hazakah, an allusion to the fourteen books which make up the complete work, but which is most commonly referred to as the Mishneh Torah. Of the eight books included here in whole or in part, four bear colophons that indicate that the work was completed in the city of Kashan in Persia in the year 1493 CE. As each colophon gives the date for the completion of that section, by calculating the interim between colophons of adjoining books, we learn that our scribe was able to complete, on average, 8 pages of text per day. The scribe identifies himself through a protracted genealogy extending back seven generations, as: Joseph ben Joshua ben Joseph ben Siman-Tov ben Yishai ben Moshe ben Avraham, “who was head of the sacred community of Faarfaan.”  Both Kashan, where the manuscript was written, and Faarfaaan (today known as Farfahan), to where the scribe traced his ancestry, are located in the Isfahan region, once home to a large and thriving Jewish community.