[Heb.: ‘order’]
The term commonly refers to the book containing the order of the regular Jewish prayer service for weekdays and the Sabbath, in contrast to the Machzor, which includes the liturgy for the yearly festival cycle. Codified from the 9th century
[Feibush Ashkenazi]
(fl 15th century).
Jewish scribe and illuminator, active in Germany and northern Italy. Although more of his work has been identified than any other medieval Jewish artist–copyist’s, all that is known about him is culled from colophons in manuscripts that he either wrote or decorated. He lived in Cologne and Bonn; most of the manuscripts attributed to him are liturgical texts, especially Haggadot (see Haggadah). He usually named himself as the scribe of a manuscript, as in the following works: First Nuremberg Haggadah (Jerusalem, Schocken Lib., MS. 24086); First New York Haggadah (New York, Jew. Theol. Semin. America Lib., MS. Mic. 4481); a prayerbook dated 1449 (Parma, Bib. Palatina, MS. 3144); a prayerbook dated 1452/3 (Turin, Bib. N. U., MS. A. III. 14); a Haggadah (Cologny, Fond. Bodmer, MS. Cod. Bodmer 81); a prayerbook dated 1469 (London, BL, MS. Add. 26957); the Washington Haggadah, dated 1478 (Washington, DC, Lib. Congr., Hebr. MS. I); and David Kimhi’s commentary on the Psalms dated ...
Family of Jewish printers, active in Italy, Turkey and Egypt. They originated in Germany but emigrated to Lombardy and settled in Soncino near Crema in 1454, taking the name of the town as their patronymic. Their first printing press was set up in Soncino by Yoshua (d 1493) and Moses (d 1489), sons of Israel Nathan (d 1492?), a physician. The family was active between 1483, the date of Yoshua’s first book, and 1562, when the 184th and last publication was printed by his great-great-nephew in Cairo. Seven family members were printers: Yoshua, his brother Moses, Moses’s sons Solomon and Gershom [Hieronymus Soncinus] (d 1534), Gershom’s children Moses and Eliezer (d 1547) and Eliezer’s son Gershom (d 1562). Yoshua published only Hebrew books (42 editions, all incunabula) during his short career (1483–9 in Soncino, 1489–92 in Naples). Gershom’s career, however, was one of the longest (...
[formerly Lat. Scarbantia; Ger. Ödenburg]
City in north-west Hungary at the foot of the Lövér Hills. It is capital of Győr-Sopron county and was built on the site of the Roman Scarbantia, originally a Celtic settlement. Roman remains to be found in the area include a Mithraeum near Sopron-Rákos, and the possible remains of an amphitheatre, discovered in 1925. A medieval wall, of which sections still remain, ringed the town in the shape of a horseshoe. St Michael, one of the oldest churches, was built during the 14th century and completed in the later 15th. In the form of a basilica, it has three aisles and a narrow transept. Its Late Gothic towered façade is decorated with richly carved figures and ornamental work, as is its long chancel and square-ended side chancel. Gothic sedilia line the entire length of the chancel. The sacristy has reticulated vaulting and a tessellated, enamelled tiled floor from the late 15th century, the only one of its kind in Hungary....
Jewish place of worship and prayer (see Jewish art §II 1., (ii)).
The structures usually have a central place for prayer, but post-medieval buildings can also have administrative offices and smaller rooms for private instruction and study.
J. L. Benito and others: Juderías y sinagogas de la sefarad medieval...[Lat.: ‘tent’]
Place of worship other than a temple or church. The term was used for the demountable tent put up by the Israelites in the wilderness, as described in the book of Exodus. In modern times it is sometimes applied to temporary structures erected by dissenting religious groups (e.g. the Baptists and other nonconformists)....
[Tel Aviv-Jaffa; Tel Aviv-Yafo]
Israeli city. It was founded in 1909 on the Mediterranean coast within a suburb of Jaffa, c. 55 km north-west of Jerusalem, as the first planned urban Jewish community in Palestine. By 1950 it had grown in size and importance to be reunited with the ancient, predominantly Arab port of Jaffa into one municipality. In 1989 the central population was estimated at 320,000, while the municipal area, covering 13 km of the Mediterranean coastline, was estimated at over 2 million. Tel Aviv serves as the cultural and financial centre for the whole State. The demand for housing, owing to the influx of Jewish immigrants, caused the constant expansion of the city’s boundaries and the increase in density. Housing has been built sporadically according to availability of land and connected by road systems, often without any insight into future needs. In the first 20 years the architecture was eclectic, combining Middle Eastern motifs with Western elements and sometimes embellished with Jewish symbols. Terracotta tiles produced at the ...
(b Metz, 1854; d 1942)
French jeweller and collector. Vever directed the family jewellery business, begun in Metz by his grandfather Pierre-Paul Vever (d 1853). After the capture of Metz in the Franco-Prussian War (1871), the family moved to Luxembourg and then Paris, where the Maison Vever became well established on the Rue de la Paix, winning the Grand Prix of the universal expositions in 1889 and 1900 and becoming a leader in the Art Nouveau movement. Vever gave an important group of Art Nouveau works to the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris. His early interest in contemporary French painting led him to assemble a large and important group of works by Corot, Sisley, Renoir and Monet, of which he sold the majority (Paris, Gal. Georges Petit, 1897) to concentrate on Japanese and Islamic art. Vever had begun to collect Japanese prints in the 1880s and in 1892 joined the distinguished private group ...
[Mahzor]
Illuminated Hebrew prayerbook for holy days in two volumes (vol. 1: Wurzburg(?), 1272; vol. 2: late 13th century; Jerusalem, N. Lib., MS. heb. 4°781). As is common for Ashkenazi Machzorim, the Worms Machzor does not contain statutory prayers, but optional liturgical poems (piyyutim), common according to the Ashkenazi rites. The two volumes that currently constitute the Worms Machzor did not originally belong together, but must have been joined at some later stage during the history of the book, when it served the community of Worms . Textual evidence points at the possibility that the second volume reflects the local prayer rite of Worms and did not originate in Würzburg.
It is primarily the first volume that stands out in terms of decoration, whereas the second is sparsely illuminated. The decorations appear as initial word panels, large arches framing several of the text pages, and marginal scenes on the outer, upper, and bottom margins, some of which were trimmed during later bindings. The scenes relate to the contents of the ...
