Perush ha-Torah (Commentary on the Pentateuch), Moses ben Nahman (Nahmanides), Rome: Obadiah, Manasseh and Benjamin of Rome [ca. 1469-73]

239 [of 246] leaves (14 1/8 x 9 3/4 in.; 360 x 245 mm). collation: 1^{7 [of 10]}, 2-11¹⁰, 12¹², 13^{1 [of 2]}, 14-15¹⁰, 16^{9 [ of 10]}, 17-24¹⁰, 25^{10 [of 12]}, = 239 leaves, lacking only two text leaves (ff. 1, 172) and the five blanks absent in most copies (ff. 1-2, 124, 245-6). Final quire bound out of sequence: 235-6, 238, 240-1, 243, 237, 239, 242, 244. Accurate foliation in modern pencil at lower outer corners of each recto; other foliations imperfect.  First and last quires strengthened at gutter; some leaves remargined; minor marginal tears and corners repaired; f. 11 cropped, not affecting text; scattered marginalia (e.g. f. 154r, 212r); running titles occasionally added in manuscript above text; loss to f. 59 repaired, affecting nine lines of text; lightly soiled and stained, heavier on ff. 190, with early repair, and on ff.219-222. Final leaf laid to size. Scattered worming generally not affecting text; save for a single wormtrack touching a few letters in top line in final quire. Bound in at end of the volume: two leaves comprising two fragmentary manuscripts: the first, a personal letter (2 pcs); the second, a page of index to Maimonides' Mishneh Torah on recto with text from a kabbalistic treatise on the mystery of sounding the shofar, on the verso. Censored passages include: f.66v, f.80v, ff. 96r-97r, f. 167v, f.194, f. 207v, f.231r, f. 234r, and f.232r. Overall, a crisp, clean, wide-margined copy. Modern diced calf.

Vinograd, Rome 6; Offenberg 96; Goff Heb-86; Hain 11669; Steinschneider 6532.48; Thes A20; BMC XIII 8 (C.50.e.5); Iakerson 1

See M. Marx, Alexander Marx Jubilee Volume [English Section] (1950), pp. 481-501. See also, A.K. Offenberg, “Catalogue of the Hebrew Incunabula in the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana” in: Studia Rosenthaliana 5:1(1971), pp. 1323; Also see his: Catalogue of books printed in the XVth century now in the British Library BMC Part XIII: Hebraica, 2004

 

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FIRST EDITION; THE ONLY SIGNED BOOK FROM THE EARLIEST HEBREW PRESS

Nahmanides (1194-1270), also known as Ramban, an acronym of Rabbi Moses ben Nahman, was a Spanish rabbi and scholar, renowned  philosopher, kabbalist, biblical exegete, poet, and physician as well as one of the leading authors of talmudic literature in the Middle Ages. Following his participation in the Barcelona disputation in 1263, Nahmanides fled Spain and immigrated to the Land of Israel where he died in 1270.

Nahmanides' Perush ha-Torah is considered by many to be the most important Torah commentary after that of Rashi. The first edition was printed in Rome sometime between 1469 and 1472, as was first proven in 1950 by famed bibliographer Moses Marx. In a groundbreaking study, Marx demonstrated, based on typographical and other internal evidence, that the undated Hebrew books printed in Rome were actually the earliest Hebrew books ever printed. Marx's hypothesis has been substantially reinforced by more recent findings concerning the watermarks on the paper of these incunabula. A.K. Offenberg noted that the watermark found in Nahmanides' Commentary recurs in at least five editions of Sweynheym and Pannartz and of Ulrich Han published in Rome between 1469 and 1472. It was Marx who made the strongest case that this Roman edition of Nahmanides was the first Hebrew book to be printed, although more recently, Offenberg has concluded that another of the Roman incunabula, the Shorashim of David Kimhi, was in fact the earliest of the group. Nevertheless, the importance of the present volume cannot be overstated, as it is the only one of all the Hebrew Roman incunabula, whose printers have shared their identity with the readers. The three Jewish printers, Obadiah, Menasseh, and Benjamin of Rome, whose names appear at the conclusion of the Book of Exodus in the present commentary (f.124v.) were likely of German origin and had learned their craft working for a non-Jewish printer in Italy. By impressing their names on the pages of this book, they identified themselves for posterity as the craftsmen in whose footsteps all Jewish printers would follow, and as inaugurators of the bold new venture of Hebrew printing.