BABYLONIAN TALMUD, TRACTATE MO'ED KATAN, VENICE: DANIEL BOMBERG, 1521

45 folios (13 1/2 x 9 1/4 in.; 341 x 235 mm) (collation: i-v8, vi5) on paper. Ornaments in manuscript on ff. 13v, 28v-29r; manuscript strikethrough on f. 26v. Slight scattered staining (but especially concentrated along gutter); lower margins stained and slightly damaged (but repaired) throughout; more extensive repairs on ff. 43-45 affecting a few words; small tears in gutter of f. [1] and in lower edge of f. 11; ff. 3, 6, 18 strengthened along gutter; f. 41 bound backwards; f. 42 bound between ff. 44-45. Modern brown leather over board with blind-tooled decorative borders and corner ornaments, slightly scuffed; spine in five compartments with raised bands; title, place, and date tooled in blind on spine; modern paper flyleaves and pastedowns.

Mo‘ed katan, the eleventh tractate in the order Mo‘ed, was itself originally referred to simply as Mo‘ed; with time, however, its name was changed to Mo‘ed katan (lit., Semi-Mo‘ed) in order to distinguish it from the mishnaic order. In three chapters, the treatise deals primarily with the laws of hol ha-mo‘ed (the intermediary days of the Passover and Sukkot festivals), especially the forms of labor (e.g., agricultural work, laundry, haircuts, etc.) prohibited on those days, as well as the circumstances under which such labor may be performed. Also discussed are the laws and customs of burial and mourning, both in general and on the Sabbath and festivals specifically. Literature

A.M. Habermann, Ha-madpis daniyyel bombirgi u-reshimat sifrei beit defuso (Safed: The Museum of Printing Art, 1978), 34 (no. 30).

Vinograd, Venice 46