Auction 78 - Rare and Important Items
Bound with: Jewish calendar in Marathi, compiled by R. David Yehuda Ashkenazi. Bombay, [1854].
Original illustrations. Illustrated title page, depicting Moshe and Aharon (inspired by the title page of the 1712 Amsterdam Haggadah). Illustrations of the Seder steps and Seder plate (inspired by the Livorno Haggadah illustrations).
The first Haggadah printed according to the rite of the Bene Israel community in India. The names of the editors and publishers are printed on the title page: "Haggadah in the Holy Tongue, with Marathi translation… compiled by R. Chaim Yosef Hallegua of Cochin, and… the author of the Marathi translation, R. Chaim Yitzchak Galsurkar… and his partner… R. Yechezkel Yosef Thalkar… first printed by the writer R. Avraham son of Yehuda Jemal…".
[5], 35 [i.e.: 36] leaves; [53] leaves. 22.5 cm. Good condition. Stains. Handwritten inscriptions. Minor wear. New, elegant leather binding.
Yaari Haggadot 656; Otzar HaHaggadot 895. Yaari, HaDfus HaIvri BeArtzot HaMizrach, Bombay, no. 92.
Provenance: Valmadonna Trust Library.
Text of the Haggadah and translation on facing pages, with corresponding pagination. Nine pages of illustrations at the beginning of the Haggadah.
Copy of the researcher and collector David Solomon Sassoon. His signature appears on inside front board: "D. S. Sassoon".
A printed booklet with copies of letters of recommendation for Aharon Daniel Telker, one of the editors of this Haggadah, was bound at the beginning of the Haggadah. A paper folder is bound after it, containing various handwritten and printed documents relating to the editors and the printing process of the Haggadah, including information on the state of Indian Jewry. English.
A piece of paper with the title (in Hebrew and Marathi) and the price of the Haggadah (in Marathi), presumably from the printed wrappers of the Haggadah, was pasted on one of the endpapers.
2, [9] leaves, [1], 5-50, 5-44, 5 pages. 20.5 cm. Good condition. Stains. Old half-leather binding. Damage to binding. Placed in a new slipcase.
Yaari 1077; Otzar HaHaggadot 1437.
Provenance:
1. Sassoon Collection.
2. Valmadonna Trust Library.
Doresh Tov LeAmo – Jewish newspaper in Judeo-Arabic. Bombay (Mumbai), 1855-1866. Lithographed. Eleven volumes of issues from all the years of the newspaper's publication.
The English subtitle "The Hebrew Gazette" was added with the eleventh issue.
The newspaper serves as a rich and unique source of information on the history of Iraqi Jews who immigrated to India. The first page of the issues features announcements of births, Brit Milah, weddings and deaths in the community. The newspaper offers reports of local communal events, general and commercial news items, with some news items about the Jewish world beyond India, and historical articles. In the first two years of its circulation, the newspaper usually appeared biweekly, yet later, beginning in 1858, it began appearing weekly. Some issues cover the events of the Great Indian Mutiny.
The newspaper was handwritten mostly in Judeo-Arabic, with some Hebrew, in cursive Baghdadi script, and reproduced in lithograph. The first two issues in 1855 were handwritten by Sassoon son of David Sassoon (see below). The rest of the issues were written by David Chaim David (his signature appears at the end of each issue). The issues were generally 4 pages long, but occasionally, 8-page issues were published, and for special occasions a several-page-long supplement was added (the supplement to issue 26 of year 4 featured a long proclamation issued by the rabbis and notables of Baghdad, containing regulations against extravagance, with over 60 clauses, announced in the synagogues in Tevet 1859 – see full translation in: Avraham ben Yaakov, Minhagei Yehudei Bavel BeDorot HaAcharonim, vol. II, Jerusalem 1993, pp. 180-193).
The front pages have a set layout. Details about the weekly portion and haftarah, and readings from Neviim and Ketuvim, appear below the newspaper title. On most front pages, illustrations of ships sailing, with the inscriptions: "London" and "to China", alongside information on ship departures to these places (a few issues note departures to other cities, such as Liverpool, Marseilles, Basra and others). Several issues offer further handwritten details (such as dates, references to Torah portions and Haftarot, and more).
These volumes of issues were in the possession of the wealthy collector David Solomon Sassoon (his bookplates appear in some volumes).
On 4th July 1908, David Solomon Sassoon published an article in The Jewish Chronicle entitled "A Unique Jewish Newspaper", containing a review of Doresh Tov LeAmo. At the time of writing the article, Sassoon only possessed two volumes of the newspaper, and he writes of his efforts to obtain more issues. Sassoon also mentions that the newspaper only had some twenty-five subscribers, who paid a monthly subscription of two rupee, and he quotes a testimony according to which subscribers would generally destroy the last issue as soon as the next appeared "so that they should not become food for insects!" (a newspaper clipping with this article was pasted on the endpaper of volume III; a galley proof of the article is also enclosed).
Eleven volumes:
• Year 1. Bombay, 1855-1856. Issues 1-27.
• Year 2. Bombay, 1856-1857. Issues 4-11, 13-26. Parts of issues 1-3, 12.
• Year 3. Bombay, 1857-1858. Issues 1-50.
• Year 4. Bombay, 1858-1859. Issues 1-51.
• Year 5. Bombay, 1859-1860. Issues 1-48 (issues 5, 11, 15 may be lacking end).
• Year 6. Bombay, 1860-1861. Issues 2-3, 18, 42, 44-48.
• Year 7. Bombay, 1861-1862. Issues 1, 10, 12, 16, 20-24, 30, 34, 36, 44-45, 48.
• Year 8. Bombay, 1862-1863. Issues 2-6, 9-10, 14-21, 23-27, 29, 35, 38-39, 45. Part of issue 46.
• Year 9. Bombay, 1863-1864. Issues 1, 9, 15, 18-21, 24-28, 30-31, 33-35, 37-39, 46-48, 51. Parts of issues 11, 16, 17, 23, 36 (several other unidentified leaves enclosed).
• Year 10. Bombay, 1864-1865. Issues 4-7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 20, 22-26, 29-31, 33-36, 38, 42.
• Year 11. Bombay, 1865-1866. Issues 10,12, 15-20.
11 volumes. Approx. 32-34 cm. Some issues printed on blue paper. Condition varies. Most issues in good condition – stains, tears and wear. Several issues in fair condition and several issues in poor condition – open tears and significant worming, with extensive damage to text, repaired in part with paper and tape. Original bindings from the Sassoon collection, vol. I with a fine, gilt decorated leather binding. Bookplates of David Solomon Sassoon in several volumes. Leaves with handwritten notes and newspaper clippings enclosed (some handwritten by David Sassoon).
A particularly rare newspaper (as mentioned, according to Sassoon, it was printed in several dozen copies only). The NLI catalog only records four volumes: 1, 2, 4 and 5. Recorded in Yaari (HaDfus HaIvri BeArtzot HaMizrach, II, Jerusalem 1940, p. 95) based on the present Sassoon copies. The British Library holds vols. 1, 3, 4, 5 and two issues of vol. 11. Apart from these, we know of no other copies.
Provenance:
1. Sassoon Collection.
2. Valmadonna Trust Library.
Hebrew Passages in Doresh Tov LeAmo
Most of the newspaper is in Judeo-Arabic, yet it occasionally contains passages in Hebrew, including some interesting contents not known from any other source.
Some examples include:
Vol. 3, issue 12, contains the text of the dedication inscribed on the cornerstone laid by David Sassoon for the first synagogue of the Baghdadi community in Bombay – built by David Sassoon.
Vol. 4, issue 38, includes a transcript of a halachic ruling regarding funerals in Bombay.
Vol. 4, issue 43, includes a prayer poem in honor of Queen Victoria (an acrostic of her name), on the occasion of the end of the Great Indian Mutiny.
Vol. 10, issue 5, includes a lamentation poem on the passing of David Sassoon – 6th Marcheshvan 1865.
The Beit David Society of the Sassoon Family
Doresh Tov LeAmo was published by the Beit David Society, founded by Iraqi Jews and named after R. David Sassoon. The society was headed by David Sassoon and his sons. The newspaper was one of the society's important undertakings. It was established by Sassoon, the son of David Sassoon, who wrote the first two issues himself (lithographed on blue paper). In the main article of the first issue, Sassoon son of David Sassoon explains that the newspaper was established to serve the small Baghdadi community in Bombay, whose members were not fluent in English, and its objective was to increase knowledge and education amongst the people and to inform of important news.
Two lithographed leaflets (on blue paper) were bound at the end of this vol. I of Doresh Tov LeAmo. The first leaflet, dated 7th Adar 1855, contains the regulations of the Beit David Society – 22 clauses defining the goals of the society: assistance to the needy, to emissaries from Eretz Israel and boys' schools, supervision of religious matters, taking care of any matter relating to the nations of the world which involves Kiddush Hashem. The regulations are signed (in lithograph) by 11 leaders of the society, headed by David Sassoon.
The second leaflet, dated 21st Adar 1855, contains the society's decision regarding the porging of meat in Bombay. This leaflet is also signed by the 11 leaders of the society (some signatures lithographed and some handwritten).
For more information regarding the Beit David society and the contents of these leaflets, see: Avraham ben David, Yehudei Bavel BaTefutzot, Jerusalem 1985, pp. 60-63.
Volume containing five issues which were part of the Sassoon collection, based on which Yaari recorded the newspaper in his book HaDfus HaIvri BeArtzot HaMizrach: Year 5, Issue 17 (15th Kislev 1867); Year 1 of HaDover BiReshut, Issue 2 (26th Nissan 1870), Issue 8 (21st Tammuz 1870), Issue 9 (4th Av 1870), Issue 16 (Erev Rosh Chodesh Kislev 1870).
Issues of this newspaper are very rare. The present volume is the largest and most complete collection of issues known to us.
The HaDover, or Dover Meisharim, newspaper was published in Baghdad by the editor Baruch son of Moshe Mizrachi, and it serves as an important historical source on Iraqi Jewry. The newspaper was entirely handwritten, in Hebrew, in semi-cursive Baghdadi script (Rashi script), and reproduced in lithograph. It began appearing in 1863, at first without government license – which caused suspensions of its publication several times. In 1870 it resumed, this time with the license of the ruler of Baghdad and with the added phrase HaDover BiReshut, in a new series (starting anew the count of the years of publication). The newspaper's publication ceased in September 1871.
Baghdadi Jews enjoyed several newspapers in Judeo-Arabic printed in India, in Bombay and Calcutta, by Iraqi Jews who had immigrated to India. HaDover was their only newspaper printed in Baghdad itself, and the only one written entirely in Hebrew. HaDover was actually the very first newspaper to appear in Iraq.
HaDover includes news and information from the Baghdadi community, various world news items, opinion pieces and Torah thoughts, and more. Some examples of the contents of the issues comprising this volume:
The Kislev 1867 issue includes an article describing the magnificent synagogue built by the Sassoon family in Bombay; news item concerning "the British Army gathering to fight with the king of Kush", and other news from Baghdad; Torah novellae; various commercial indexes (food, clothing, currency, commodities, rental); announcements of the Baghdad Beit Din; description of the arrival of a Pasha from Constantinople in Baghdad; special prayer in honor of Moses Montefiore by R. Shlomo Bechor Chutzin, and more.
The Nissan 1870 issue describes, among other things, the sermon of the Ben Ish Chai for Shabbat HaGadol: " On Shabbat HaGadol… the entire community gathered in the Great Synagogue, and there the famous preacher, R. Yosef Chaim son of R. Eliyahu son of R. Moshe Chaim stood and delivered his sermon, using parables throughout…, as well as laws of koshering utensils and destroying Chametz…".
The issue from Erev Rosh Chodesh Kislev 1870 describes the visit of the King of Persia to Baghdad, and the honor accorded to him by the Jewish community: "…even the Torah scrolls were taken out in his honor… the school children also stood in procession, and everyone crowded together in Turkish attire especially prepared for the occasion…".
Other issues contain various announcements about the deaths of public figures, information about the state of the Tigris and Euphrates, news of visits to Baghdad by high-ranking personalities, theft and robberies, wars between different countries, and more.
The newspaper was distributed outside Baghdad as well. It was sold in India and Persia, and even reached other places.
5 issues (2 leaves per issue). Size varies, 1867 issue: 26 cm; other issues: approx. 30 cm. Condition varies, fair-good. Stains, including dampstains and ink stains. Tears, including open tears, affecting text in several places. Some tears repaired with tape. Inscriptions in one issue. Old binding.
Very rare.
Provenance:
1. Sassoon Collection (Yaari, HaDfus HaIvri BeArtzot HaMizrach, list of books printed in Baghdad, no. 1. Yaari recorded the newspaper based on the present issues from the Sassoon collection).
2. Valmadonna Trust Library.