We have added a few very rare and significant manuscripts to the manuscripts page. Here is a list and their descriptions. The descriptions have been quoted from the World Digital Library and linked to their website:
# 10) Damascus Pentateuch Masoretic Manuscript – Keter Damesek – כתר דמשק
Located at: National Library of Israel
The Damascus Pentateuch, from around the year 1000, is one of the oldest extant Hebrew biblical manuscripts. It includes full vocalization, accentuation, and Masoretic annotation. The manuscript is defective in its beginning, as it starts with Genesis 9:26; Exodus 18:1–23 is also missing. Written on parchment in oriental square script, the text is in three columns per page, 20 lines per column. The manuscript belonged to the Jewish community of Damascus (hence its name) until 1915, when it was acquired by the collector and bibliophile D.S. Sassoon. In 1975 it was acquired by the Jewish National and University Library (what later became the National Library of Israel). Pentateuch is a term for the first five books of the Hebrew Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. The Masoretic annotations are the collection of critical notes, compiled in the 7th–10th centuries by Jewish scribes and scholars known as the Masoretes and accepted as the authoritative regulator of the written and vocalized transmission of the Hebrew Bible.
# 11) Partial Hebrew Tanach (Prophets, Psalms, Chronicles) Masoretic Manuscript
Located at: National Library of Israel
This manuscript, possibly a remnant of a complete Hebrew Bible, includes books from the Nevi’im (Prophets) as well as the books of Chronicles and Psalms from the Ketuvim(Hagiographa or writings) section of the Bible. (The tripartite division of the Hebrew Bible includes the Torah, the Prophets, and the Hagiographa.) It includes full vocalization and accentuation, as well as some Masorah Parva notes. The latter are very brief notes on the side margins or between columns, which are part of the Masorah, the collection of critical notes, compiled in the 7th–10th centuries by Jewish scribes and scholars known as the Masoretes and accepted as the authoritative regulator of the written and vocalized transmission of the Hebrew Bible. The manuscript is on parchment, in Ashkenazi square script, with two columns per page and 28–30 lines per column. The leather binding was added by an apparently Christian owner of the manuscript in France in the beginning of the 18th century.
# 12) Cervera Bible Masoretic Manuscript
Located at: National Library of Portugal
The Cervera Bible is among the oldest and most significant Sephardi Bibles to survive the destruction of most of the Jewish communities in the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon beginning in 1391 and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492 and from Portugal in 1498. An extremely rare example of the Iberian Hebrew paleography of its time, this manuscript on parchment consists of 451 folios in two columns, each with 31 lines. Profusely illuminated in gold and color with Mozarabic and Jewish motifs, it includes the books of the Old Testament, the Masorah (the body of textual criticism of the Hebrew Scriptures with notes on writing, vocabulary, and variant sources, pronunciation, and other comments), and a grammatical treatise, Sefer Ha-Nikud (The book of vocalization, which is better known as Et Sofer, literally, “The writer’s pen”), written by Rabbi David Kimhi (circa 1160−circa 1235). The scribe who copied the main text, Samuel Ben Abraham ibn Nathan, is identified in the colophon at folio 434 recto. This page also states that the work was executed in Cervera (present-day Lleida Province, Catalonia, Spain); it was begun on July 30, 1299 and completed on May 19, 1300. This colophon also originally included the identity of the patron, which was later erased, probably because of a change of ownership. The identity of the illuminator, Josef Asarfati, a Jew of French origin who settled in Castile, is found in the last folio of the codex, a colophon in zoomorphic letters, making this is a rare example of a Hebrew manuscript containing an explicit signature of the artist. The identity of the Masorah scribe (Josue ben Abraham ibn Gaon) is also known, as his name is inscribed in 20 places in the Masoretic text. The illuminations are spread across many frames and display a remarkable diversity of color and forms. They include ornamental page borders, full-page illuminations representing Jewish iconography, and smaller illuminations illustrating parts of the Old Testament or symbolizing its different books or depicting objects from the Tabernacle used in worship. Some of the illuminations have a largely decorative function (e.g., the hunting scenes and the drolleries). Many of the full-page illuminations are found in the treatise on grammar, where they frame the text with architectural, animal, and human-figure motifs. The Masoretic text is developed in micrographic script, forming geometric schemes and stylized vegetable, animal, and mythic animal motifs. The binding, with cardboard folders covered in red leather and engravings in gold and marbled flyleaves, dates from the 18th century. The manuscript was acquired in 1804, in The Hague, on the initiative of António Ribeiro dos Santos (1745−1818), head librarian of the Royal Public Library of the Court in Lisbon, for the sum of 240,000 reis.
# 13) Hebrew Bible Masoretic Manuscript
Located at: Complutense University of Madrid
This manuscript of the Hebrew Bible is comprised of 340 large-format folios in parchment of excellent quality written in three columns. They present a beautiful Sephardic square letter of the biblical text, with Minor Masorah on the margins and between the columns, and Major Masorah in the upper and lower margins, in three and four lines respectively. The text has Tiberian Hebrew punctuation, which greatly resembles that in the best Eastern codices that are examples of this tradition. The parashiyyot (in singular,parashah, annual pericope) are indicated in the margin by means of the abbreviation parash or the letter peh (both decorated). The order of the books of the Bible coincides with the one prescribed in the Babylonian Talmud. In most cases, the Major Masorah is ornamental, especially in the outer margins of the first books of the Pentateuch, and forms micrographs with plant and geometric motifs that in places are reminiscent of large candelabra. This characteristic of the manuscript has given rise to some doubts about its place of origin, since candelabra-shaped micrographs are more common among Catalonian Bibles of the second half of the 14th century. It seems clear, however, that this Bible cannot be associated with the Catalonian school of the 14th century. It is dated to the 13th century, and the style of the candelabra in this manuscript is different from those in Catalonian Bibles. The manuscript reproduces a note concerning proof of purchase that until recently was thought to be the colophon. It states that the Bible was bought by brothers Isaac and Abraham ben Maimón in Toledo in 1280. The manuscript’s Toledan origin seems plausible given the sedarim (singular form, seder, triennial pericope), a typical feature of the Bibles of the Kingdom of Toledo. However, candelabra-shaped micrographs are not found in any other known Toledan manuscript. At the end of the Pentateuch, the Early Prophets, the Latter Prophets, and the Chronicles are exhaustive Masoretic notes that state the total number of the verses and pericopes, as well as the verse, the word, and the medial letter of each book of the Pentateuch, along with other lists with information about the text. The verse recount, which appears at the end of each book of the Bible, generally appears within an ornate vignette (cut off in some cases). The manuscript was part of the collection owned, used, and annotated by the convert Alfonso de Zamora (circa 1474–circa 1544), teacher of Hebrew in Salamanca and Alcalá de Henares. Evidence for his ownership is apparent in his characteristic way of numbering chapters or naming the books of the Bible, for example. The manuscript is also known to be the one used extensively for the composition of the Hebrew text of the Complutensian Polyglot Bible of 1514. It has a Complutense (of Alcalá de Henares) cloth binding from the 16th century and bears the golden coat of arms of the Complutense University of Madrid.
# 14) Hebrew Bible Masoretic Manuscript
Located at: National Library of Israel
This manuscript Hebrew Bible with full vocalization, accentuation, and Masorah annotation was created in Spain in around 1300. The Bible is illustrated and decorated in color, silver, and gold. The books of the Bible are arranged in the conventional order later adopted in Hebrew printed editions, with the exception that Ecclesiastes precedes Lamentations. Written on parchment in Sephardi square script, the manuscript has three columns per page, with 35 lines per column. The Masorah Magna notes are written in micrography. Masorah refers to the collection of critical notes, compiled in the 7th–10th centuries by Jewish scribes and scholars known as the Masoretes, and accepted as the authoritative regulator of the written and vocalized transmission of the Hebrew Bible, especially in matters of spelling, vocalization and accentuation. The Masora Magna refers to the relatively long notes on the upper and lower margins of a Bible manuscript, as distinguished from the notes surrounding the first letter of each book (the Initial Masorah) and on the side margins or between columns (the Masorah Parva). The Jewish National and University Library (what later became the National Library of Israel) received the manuscript as a gift in 1969.
# 15) Torah with Haftarah Selections Masoretic Manuscript
Located at: National Library of Israel
This Hebrew Pentateuch with Haftarot (portions from the Prophets section of the Hebrew Bible, read in synagogue on Sabbaths and holidays following the Torah portion) added at the end was created in Sana’a, Yemen, in 1485. The manuscript includes full vocalization, accentuation, and Masorah annotation. The Haftarot include the Targum, or Aramaic translation, following each verse. Preceding the Torah text itself are two grammatical treatises (comprising 15 leaves in total) common in Yemen. The manuscript is written on paper in Yemenite square script, in two columns per page, with 25 lines per column. Created by David ben Benayah ben Saadiah ben Zekhariah, a member of a well-known family of Yemeni scribes, the manuscript has been owned by the Hibshoosh family since 1910. The three divisions of the Hebrew Bible are the Torah (Pentateuch), the Prophets, and Writings or Hagiographa. The Masorah annotations are the collection of critical notes, compiled in the 7th–10th centuries by Jewish scribes and scholars known as the Masoretes, and accepted as the authoritative regulator of the written and vocalized transmission of the Hebrew Bible.
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