Manuscript editions of the Corfu Mahzor serve as the major source for Hebrew liturgical poetry of the Byzantine Empire. Though the Mahzor has never been printed in its entirety, many of the poems found within it were published recently on the basis of manuscripts, including the present one. A list of the poems contained in this 🐓manuscript can be found in Hirschfeld’s catalog.

Volume 2, fol. 29r contains Yizkor notes, entries in Hebrew and Italian containing the dates of death of the writer’s father, Mordecai Nahmoli (Naeamieli) and his wife, in addition to other members of the Nahmoli family. The dates listed include 1669, 1672 and 1723-1792. Some of the dates are also given according to the Christian calendar. The Nahmolis were a prominent family in Corfu. A diagram of a kabbalistic tree is found in volume 2, fol. 78r. 

Sotheby’s is grateful to Menahem Schmelzer z”l and Ben🌊jamin Richler for cataloguing this manuscript.

Provenance

Samuel …Zadic.(?) (owner’s inscript😼ion, Vol. 1, fol. 74v) — David Naeamieli (owner’s inscription, end flyleaf) — Maimon Naeamieli (owner’s inscription, end flyleaf) — Solomon Halberstam (shelf no. 63)

Physical Description

2 volumes on paper.  Both volume👍s are 10 x 7 ½ inches; 254 x 191 mm, written in Oriental square and cursive scripts, vols. 1 and 2 were probably written by different hands. Volume 1: 109 leaves (2 blank), decorated letters (fol. 34r, etc.), catchwords, modern foliation in pencil; dampstaining throughout. Marbled paper over boards, leather spine. Volume 2: 117 leaves, illustration of a lion surrounding the word Aryeh (fol. 3v); corners reinforced on fols. 13-18, bottom half of fols. 40-45 tissued. ♓Library buckram.

Literature

Hirschfeld (mss. nos. 195-196); L. J. Weinberger, Rabbanite and Karaite Liturgy in South-Eastern Europe, 1991; N. Wieder, The Formation of Jewish Liturgy in the East and the West, 1998, pp. 364, 465