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682 THE JEWISH QUARTERLY REVIEW
about this, and the admission of the pupil's hand is really, on the
good old Jewish principle of 13D, an argument for the cardinal's
veracity. Moreover, we may throw a sop to the expert, and plead
that the pupil is later than the master, and therefore inclined to the
end rather than the beginning of his century.
Anyhow, the picture the book gives us of the cordial relations
between Jew and Christian in mediaeval Italy is quite as fine as
anything painted in it by even Giotto the master. The cardinal
ordering a Jew's prayerbook to be illuminated for a bookworm by
the finest artist of the day. The Pope signing and sealing permission
for that same bookworm to read the book and treasure it. The
Jewish vagrant scribe discoursing to these great dignitaries of the
Church on the glorious learning of his Rabbi. Are we quite as broad-
minded nowadays ? How many Jewish millionaires are there who
would pay as much for a Barmitzvah present to his own son and heir
or make so edifying a choice ? How many Jewish bidders were there
for this very little book ?
E. N. Adleb.
LAY POEMS OF BAGDAD.
(AN UNKNOWN HEBREW DIVAN OP ALCHAEISl'S TIME.)
During a visit to Aleppo in the fall of last year, I felt the keenest
disappointment at the poor results achieved after a systematic search
for literary treasure in what— from a distance— seemed so rich a
quarry. I delved and groped in the recesses of the huge Genizah
of the oldest and one of the largest Synagogues now existing, but
though the dust was more acrid, and the work far dirtier than that
of Fostat, the matrix was modern, and the dirt not pay dirt. I left
the ancient city discouraged and disgusted, but just as I reached
the gate a poor man hurried up with a bundle of pages which
he offered me. I did not want to take it, but by way of polite
negative, offered him half a mejidieh. "It is yours," he cried, and
passed me the bundle, which I accepted without enthusiasm, though
with a sort of idea that it might serve as " Reise Literatur." When,
however, I came to examine it, I found that it was veritable treasure-
trove — better than anything I had consciously acquired. It turned
out to be the Divan, or rather a very large fragment of the Divan,
composed by an Eastern poet, probably of Bagdad, who was on
terms of intimacy with the son of Maimonides, and most of the other
Hebrew worthies of his time. Its style is not unlike that of the
Tahkemoni, and of the same date. The volume contains 281 poems
MISCELLANEA 683
to or about various persons, and the following is an index of their
names : —
Aaron, 3, 10, 11, 193.
Abd al Aziz b. Koratha, 180, married to the daughter of Abu'l Faraj
b. Barachel; his brother (?), Shams al Dawla, 186.
Abiathar, 180, 206.
Abraham, 181, 191, 217.
Abraham b. R. Moses b. R. Maimon, 208, the son and successor of
Maimonides, D3 nflfl 7K p QnsDI nU»B* VfftO 3pJP ">3\tQ D"I3N . . n&O
(195)-
Abram, 195.
Abu AH b. Shafar (lB{?), 41.
Abu'l Ala ibn al 'Ukbur ( = Solomon), 205.
Abu'l Ala ibn al Attar, 43.
Abu'l Baka, 268.
Abu'l Faraj b. Barachel, 181, 183, father-in-law of Izz al Dawla b.
Abi Jacob, son-in-law of Abd al Aziz.
Abu'l Faraj Halevi b. Abi Ishak (of Awm) al Awini, 187 (? Uweini).
Abu'l Ganaim b. al Barkuli, 163.
Abu'l Karam b. al Attar, 173, father of Abu Mansur (=Eleazer).
Abu nasr b. al Karam b. al 'Akrab (=Saadia), 184.
Abu nasr R. Joseph b. al Barkuli, 161, 113.
Abu'l Ridha b. al Gadhairi, 210.
Abul Tayyib b. Fadlan, 178.
Abu'l Saadat Jacob, 224, the poet's son.
Abu Tahir b. al 'Sebbag, 216.
Alexandria nmj3DK7N, 160.
Ali (?Eli), 112, 176, 178 "Gaon Jacob," 219.
Ali, the Rosh Yeshiba, 55 ; his son Zachariah, 178; his son Joshua
'Safi al Dawla, 179; his infant son, 219.
Amin al Dawla Abu Mansur b. Almashi'iri, 181, cp. 8=Eleazer, 173 ;
his sons Joshua and Isaac.
Amram ben Judah, 232.
Asher, 2.
Azariah, 2, 11, 227, cp. 209; "D'Oy T33," 218.
Babel, Babylon 733, 9, 118, 170, 181, 188, 213, 214, 225, also called
nny, 3, 9, 197, 214, 270.
Bagdad INTO, 125.
Benjamin, 2.
fPM3, 11.
Daniel, 9, 10, 11, 163a, 167, 168, 177, 180, 206, 216, 225.
Daniel, " Gaon Jacob," 203.
Daniel, the Resh Gola, 33.
684 THE JEWISH QUARTERLY REVIEW
Daniel, the Nagid, 18, 183, 199, 203.
Daniel, the Resh Yeshiba b. Abi'l Rabi' hac Cohen, 167, 189, cp. 170 ;
his sons, 189; Samuel, 203.
Eleazar, the Nagid 0>K DJ? TM), 213.
Eleazer, vide Abu Na'sr, 2, 4, 8, 163, 172, 173, 180, 182, 184, 194, 198,
206, 214.
Eliezer, 2, 8, 206, 217 ; the poet's son, 272.
Elijah, 189.
Elimelech, 29.
Ephraim, 205, 217.
Ezekiel, the Nagid, 183.
Ezekiel, 118, 181, 182, 203, 210, 220, vide Gara, &c.
Ezra, 2, 3, 163 a, 173, 189, 197, 206.
Ezra b. al Thika, 47.
Gars al Dawla b. al Mu'ir (= Ezekiel), 220.
Hai, son of Moses, the Nagid, 169.
Hananel, 181.
al Harbi, 164.
Hezekiah, the Nagid, 262.
Hisdai, 172.
Isaac, 2, 4, 8, 18, 129, 171, 182, 187, 194, 203.
Isaac, the Nagid, 168, 169, 225.
Isaac, the Resh Yeshiba, 4, son of Eleazer.
Isaac b. al Shuyukh the Rosh Yeshiba, 214.
Isaac b. Sadok "Gaon Jacob," 19, cp. 8 ; eldest son " M3 BWi."
Israel, 117.
Izz al Dawla Abul Ma'ali b. Abiyakub al Ra'is al ajal, 119 1 .
Izz al Dawla b. Abiyakub, 183, 200, 221, son-in-law of Abu'l Faraj
b. Barachel; his daughter, 221 ; his Hebrew name Samuel, 221.
Jacob, 158, 171.
Jamal al Dawla b. al Khadhabi, 169.
Jephet, 180, 183, 203, 213.
Jerubaal, 158.
Jeshua (nylE*), 182, 183, 187, 203, 217.
R. Jochanan b. Hadid, 26.
Joseph, 45, 49, 121, 123, 124, 125, 127, 171, 173, 174, 180, 181, 183,
184, 185, 193, 202, 203, 206, 211, 212, 214, 217.
R. Joseph b. al Bar Kuli, 113 ; in Wasit tDDNl, 161. (Alcharisi dedi-
cated the Tach Kemoni to Albarkoli of Cairo.)
Joseph, the Nagid, 2, 113-117.
Joseph, the poet's son, 272.
1 A kinsman of Maimonides ; cp. Kaufmann, Revue d. Etudes Juives, VII,
152, and Steinschneider, H. Bibl., XVI, 10.
MISCELLANEA 685
Rabbenu Joseph b. Gershon, 9.
Joshua, 178, 184, 189.
Joshua, son of R. T. Ali, 179, vide 'Safiy al Dawla.
Joshua, son of R. Y. Daniel, 189.
Judah, 203.
Karaites, 1 18, 174.
Meborach, 177, 187, 205, 216, 217.
Mehallel b. Aaron, 268.
Mordecai, the Nagid, 222.
Mordecai, 168, 213, 222.
Moses, the Nagid, 7, 169.
Moses, 3, 159, 165, 171, 173, 181, 185, 193, 195, 197, 216, 217.
Muhaddab al Dawla b. Al Mashi'iri (*VjR5>NE)ijK), 8, 25 (= Isaac).
Muhaddab al Dawla b. Mordecai (=Isaac), 168, vide Amin al Dawla
Abu Mansur, 181.
Mu'tamid al Dawla b. Karam, 207 ; ibn Karam, 218.
Nagid, 113, 164, 169, 186, 196, 198.
Najm al Dawla b. Abi'l Su'tid, 7.
R. Nathan al A'jami, 215.
Nehemiah, 4, 10, 11, 216.
Nissim, 28, 216.
R. Nissim b. Eladib, 39.
Nissim b. Moses, the Nagid, 169.
Obadiah, 8, 160 (the poet?), 174, 206.
Phineas, 10, 11, 180, 183, 194, 198, 203, 206.
■VPs, 27.
Raba ra»B»n pD, 4.
Saadia, 172, 173, 177, 184, 189, 192, 193, 194, 198, 203, 214, 218, 219.
Saadia, son of R. T. Daniel, 189.
Sabbatai, 2.
Sa'd al Mazrufi, a convert to Karaism, 174.
Safiy al Dawla Joshua son of R. Y. Ali, 55.
Samuel Cohen b. Abil RabI, 170 ; his brother, cp. 167.
R. Y. Samuel Levi b. al Dustur, his daughter, 4, 6, 10, 11; DN"i
mTlDPtf in Bagdad, the correspondent of Maimonides.
Samuel, 221, 223 = Izz al Dawla, 2, 161, 173, 173 a, 181, 183, 187,
194, 199, 199 a, 203, 204, 206, 216, 223.
Samuel, the Nagid, 170, 186, 195, 203, 218.
Dli>C It?, 193.
rmtj>, 11.
Saul, 9.
Shams al Dawla abu'l Husein b. Abi'l Rabf, ? brother of Daniel,
father of Sadid al Dawla Abu Mansur.
686 THE JEWISH QUARTERLY REVIEW
Shams al Dawla b. Koratha, 186, 196, 199, 209, ? brother of Abd al
Aziz, 180 ; keeper of the JV3.
Sharaf al Dawla the Karaite, 118 ; at Bagdad Khuaja XlpD vJD D"i
forDNl, ?Ezekiel.
Shoeib, a doctor, 195 ; his daughter.
Solomon, 177, 178, 203, 204, 206, 216.
Zaehariah, 179, 184.
Zachariah b. R. Y. Ali, 178 "Gaon Jacob."
I showed the precious volume to Professor Steinschneider in Berlin.
That venerable bibliographer was at no loss to trace or place it. By
the aid of his Jewish Quarterly Review list of Arabic names,
he found that one of the poems, the 179th, had been published as far
back as 1855 in the third volume of p?nn, and by himself! It was
from a fragment of two leaves, formerly in MS. Hunt. 525, at the
Bodleian. It was afterwards taken out of that volume and bound up
with others as MS. Opp. add. 4to 151. The number in Neubauer's
Catalogue is 2424 (4). In the Oxford fragment three poems are
numbered 281 to 283. My no. 179 is that numbered 282, but though
the order is different we may assume that the original Divan had
at least a hundred more poems than my copy '.
The poem numbered 283 in the Bodleian Fragment was also
deemed of much importance. Graetz devotes a long note to it in
the seventh volume of his History (pp. 481 et seq.). The poem begins
VJ1D ?DD "it5>N 7N DJJ IVIJ , and is ascribed by him to be in praise of
Mordecai ibn Alcharbija, the Sa'd al Dawla, or " Saad-Addaula " as
he is generally called. For his father's name we have in our MS. in
the heading to 164, \3"U"6n. From the scanty material before
him, Graetz was able to assign the authorship of the Fragment
to an Eastern poet of the end of the thirteenth century. The Divan
now before us makes this assumption a certainty, and our historian's
happy combination of audacity with accuracy is again justified.
For the rest, we can glean something of the author's personality
from the Divan. We know the people with whom he corresponded
and those who were his patrons. His name may perhaps have
been Obadiah (160), and he would seem to have had to mourn the
loss of three sons— Isaac, Eleazer (8, 19), and Jacob or Abu'l sa'adat
(224). He was apparently a native of Bagdad (Babel or Adina or
"1K"U3 as he calls it), and, though a Rabbinist, was on friendly
relations even with Karaites.
1 To complete this index, add the following names which occur in the
Oxford fragment; — Abraham, 281; Alcharbija, 283; Chalafta, 281;
David, 281 ; Mordecai, 283 ; Phineas, 280, 281 ; Saadia, 281 ; Samuel,
280.
MISCELLANEA 687
The side-light the MS. throws upon the Persian Jews of the
time is extremely valuable. What one can glean about them from
contemporary records has hitherto been most scanty. Maimonides
and his son corresponded with some Persians ; Alcharisi, the European
poet traveller, belittled them. Benjamin of Tudela catalogues the
ten Roshe Yeshiba of his day. Bar Hebraeus, or rather his "con-
tinuator," celebrates their great but unfortunate statesman, the Saad-
Addaula, but nobody has hitherto quite lifted their veil of Oriental
secrecy. Dr. Israel Levi, in an ingenious essay in the Revue des
Etudes Juives, attributes to him the tomb of Mordecai, still reverenced
by Hamadan Jews as that of the Mordecai, and not a mere ' 1, 3T1D
|DTn" as many a Nagid was called in the thirteenth century.
1 cannot pretend to adjudicate upon his theory, but it is certainly
supported by the fact that an inscription on Esther's tomb says it
was built in 1307 by the physician, Abu Shams, the son of Awhad(?).
The Persian names of our MS. are most instructive. To this very
day, every Persian Jew has a double name— a biblical one for his
family, his friends, and his co-religionists, and a Moslem name for
business and the state.
The book itself is written in a fine thirteenth-century Persian hand
on brown Oriental paper, large 8vo, double columns, twenty lines
to the page. Professor Steinschneider wants me to publish it in the
DWO ^pD. It certainly is a precious addition to our knowledge of
the Babylonian Jews, and I do not know whether to be glad or sorry
that in this respect it exceeds any of the 157 Hebrew Persian MSS.
I have managed to collect from the Persian Jews of to-day in their
own homes.
E. N. Adlek.
