Hebrew Printing in Baghdad

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Advisor: Brad Sabin Hill, YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York

Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic Printing inBaghdad

Rare Printed Books from the Valmadonna Trust Library, London

Nearly 350 titles including:

The earliest lithographs

Unrecorded Judeo-Arabic books

Rare Hebrew liturgies

Unique treasures from theSassoon Collection

Title list available at: www.idc.nl


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Printing in BaghdadThe Hebrew press in Baghdad was oneof the last Hebrew presses establishedin the Orient. In the 1860s a journal anda few books were produced bylithography, among themMasaot shelRabi Binyamin [the medieval travelogueof Benjamin of Tudela], one of thelengthiest lithographic books everprinted in Hebrew. Before 1870,movable Hebrew type was introducedby a printer trained in Bombay, andBaghdad became the most prolificcenter of Hebrew printing in the Orientafter Jerusalem and Istanbul. Over thecourse of 75 years, the Hebrew printersof Baghdad issued over 400 books andpamphlets.

Early printersMost active of the early printers was thescholar and entrepreneur SolomonBekhor Hutsin (1843-1892), who beganas a bookseller. (Hutsins catalogue of1872 was the first Hebrew booksellerscatalogue printed anywhere in theOrient.) In 1888 Hutsin launched a new

press using type from Leghorn, Italy, aninternational center of Hebrew printing.Hutsins more than 70 books, whichstand out in aesthetic and content from

those of his predecessors, includeliturgical works for local use, someolder Baghdadi writings, and reprints ofHebrew books first issued in India andEurope.

Dangoor Printing HouseWith permission of the Sultan, a newHebrew printing house was establishedin 1904 by Ezra Reuben Dangoor(1848-1930), a native of Baghdad whohad served as rabbi of Rangoon inBurma. Dangoor, who also used pressesand type imported from Europe, was themost productive of the Baghdadprinters, issuing over 100 books largelyedited by himself. During the BritishMandate, several new Hebrew presseswere established, notably El WataniyahIsrailiyah, and the press of ElishaShohet which functioned until 1940. Asmall number of Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic books were printed during andafter the War.

SubjectsThe Hebrew printing at Baghdad covers

a limited range of traditional Jewishliterature, especially hagiographies andliturgical texts, perhaps the widestvariety of special liturgies ever issued in

a single Hebrew printing center. TheBaghdad imprints also comprise a richresource for Hebrew liturgical poetryand related poetic compositions(piyutim), which are often incorporatedin non-liturgical works. There are manyeditions of the Mishnaic treatiseAvotand of the Passover Hagadah, most withJudeo-Arabic sharh.

Works printed at Baghdad are almost allof Iraqi or oriental authorship. Localauthors include the rabbinic scholarsJoseph al-Hakam, Abdallah Somekh,and Solomon Twena, who later settledin India and founded a press at Calcuttawhere he printed over 70 books. A fewworks of Ashkenazic origin includesegulotby a Hungarian rabbi and twoethical tracts by Lithuanian maskilim,reprinted from European editions. Themany secular works include communalregulations, fables, Hebrew languagetexts, calendrical treatises, eulogies, aswell as historical writings and story-books, mostly in Judeo-Arabic, amongthem extracts from the Arabian Nights,

tales of Sindbad the sailor, and anaccount of the House of Rothschild.

Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic printing in BaghdadThe Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic books from Baghdad comprise an unparalleled resource forthe study of oriental printing, Hebrew liturgical history, Judeo-Arabic literature, and thehistory and culture of the most ancient Jewish diaspora community. With this publicationIDC Publishers makes this important collection generally available to modern research.

Nizamnamat akhad al-Askar[on conscription ofnon-Muslims], in Judeo-Arabic (Baghdad, 1907).

Kawanin al-Tajariyah [commercial laws],in Judeo-Arabic (Baghdad, 1870).

Muanis al-Sibyan [Sindbad the Sailor], in Judeo-Arabic (Baghdad, 1905).


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LanguagesBaghdad was one of several dozentowns where Judeo-Arabic was printed,and the most important center of Judeo-Arabic printing after Tunis. Aside frombooks entirely in Hebrew, a largeproportion of the Hebrew-titled bookscontain some text in Judeo-Arabic.

Over 75 of the Hebrew-character booksare entirely in Judeo-Arabic, orexplicitly in Arabic in Hebrewcharacters. The Hebrew books areprinted in either square or Rashi(cursive) characters, but the Judeo-Arabic books are almost all in squarecharacters, in a few cases with vowelpoints, useful for pronunciation ofBaghdadi Judeo-Arabic. One Judeo-Arabic book was sponsored by awoman. Aside from books in Hebrewand Judeo-Arabic, there are severalAramaic targums and the ZoharicIdrazuta andIdra raba. There is one editionof the Passover Hagadah with Judeo-Persian translation.

Ornament and FormatLike other Hebrew books from theOrient, those printed at Baghdad bearminimal ornamentation. Amongornamental devices are a bird on a tree,a basket of flowers and fruit, a clusterof grapes, and the royal Turkish arms. Afew woodcut illustrations include a manblessing wine, a sailboat, a table laden

with fruits and vegetables. One volumedisplays the smoke and smokestack of alocomotive, a symbol of the railroadlinking Baghdad with other parts of theOttoman Empire. A few books containportraits of the authors (one of theprinter Dangoor), uncommon in Hebrewbooks. Some books make use of coloredinks, gold or red. The title pages ofBaghdad imprints are often printed onlyas paper covers, sometimes on coloredpaper. Many books were printedwithout title pages, imitating

manuscripts.Most of the imprints are small books,both in length and in physicaldimensions. About half are octavos,most of the rest duodecimos orsextodecimos; there are few folios orquartos. The largest book is the two-partlegal compendiumZivhe Tsedek, printedby Joshua Hutsin in 1904. Two of themost curious of the Baghdad imprintsare scrolls, among the few instances inHebrew booklore of printed Estherscrolls, once prohibited by the rabbis.

The Sassoon Collection and theValmadonna LibraryThe Valmadonna Trust Library, housedin London, is the worlds foremostprivate collection of early and rare

Hebraica, especially printed books fromItaly, Ottoman Greece, Turkey andPalestine, India, and Baghdad. In 1999the Trust acquired the remaining raritiesfrom the celebrated library of theAnglo-Jewish bibliophile D. S. Sassoon(1880-1942), whose oriental Hebrewmanuscripts and books included the rich

corpus of Hebrew printing in Baghdad.The books in the Sassoon collection,together with those in the JewishNational and University Library inJerusalem as of 1940, served as thebasis for YaarisHebrew Printing in theEast.

The Valmadonna Library holds thelargest research collection in the world

of Hebrew printing from Baghdad,including nearly 50 previouslyunrecorded titles and many unica,unique surviving copies. Altogether theHebrew and Judeo-Arabic books fromBaghdad comprise an unparalleledresource for the study of orientalprinting, Hebrew liturgical history,

Judeo-Arabic literature, and the historyand culture of the most ancient JewishDiaspora community. All of thesebibliographic treasures are reproducedhere for the first time.

Brad Sabin HillYIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York

Benjamin of Tudela, Sefer Masaot[travelogue] (Baghdad, 1866). Lithograph.


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The Netherlands Phone +31 (0)71 514 27 00

IDC Publishers Fax +31 (0)71 513 17 21

P.O. Box 11205 E-mail [email protected]

2301 EE Leiden Internet http://www.idc.nl

For more information please contact any of the following addresses For American customers only

North America Phone 212 271 5945

IDC Publishers Inc. Toll free 800 757 7441

350 Fifth Avenue, Suite 1801 Fax 212 271 5930

New York, NY 10118 E-mail [email protected]

604.1000 no. 1193

BibliographyBenayahu, M. Hebrew Books Composed inBaghdad, and books copied there (Jerusalem,1993, in Hebrew).

Hill, B. S.Hebraica from the Valmadonna Trust(London, 1989).

Rabinowicz, H. The Sassoon Library. In his:Treasures of Judaica (London, 1971).

Roth, C. The Sassoon Dynasty (London, 1941).

Sassoon, D. S. Ohel Dawid: DescriptiveCatalogue of the Hebrew and Samaritan

Manuscripts in the Sassoon Library, London

(London, 1932).

Sassoon, D. S.A History of the Jews in Baghdad(Letchworth, 1949).

Sothebys. Catalogue of the Sassoon Collection ofHighly Important Hebrew Printed Books

(London, 1970). [The first of many Sassoon salecatalogues.]

Yaari, A. Hebrew Printing in Baghdad. In his:Hebrew Printing in the East(Jerusalem, 1936-1940, in Hebrew). Addenda by A. Ben-Jacob andA. Yaari in Kiryat Sefer22 (1945/46) and 24(1947/48).

Title listThe title list can be downloadedfrom www.idc.nlIf you prefer a printed list, pleasecontact us by e-mail at [email protected]

0564AA56

Language Number of titles Number of fiches

Hebrew 266 512

Judeo-Arabic 158 222

Aramaic 125 288

Arabic 1 3

English 1 3

Judeo-Persian 1 1

General informationScope 346 titles

Number of fiche 608

Size of fiche 105 x 148 mm.

Film type Positive silver halide

Reduction ratio Varies depending on the size of the original

Internal Eye-legible headers on every fiche indicating the author,

finding aids abbreviated title, place and date of printing of each item

External Bibliographic records for all titles ordered are supplied

information in AACR2/MARC21 format with the microfiches

Titles are also available separately

Publishers' noteThe Valmadonna Library holds various copies of some titles. In those instances inwhich copies vary, IDC Publishers decided to film either both the complete copiesor the varying part(s) only (e.g., an extra title page). The variations have beenfilmed under one title and and will always be sent together.

The collection by languageSome works contain texts in more than one language. This overview lists thenumber of works that contain texts in that specific language. Title lists bylanguage are available at www.idc.nl or can be requested in printed form bywriting to [email protected].

Cover illustration from: Sefer Maasiyot[book of tales] (Baghdad, 1869).

Tarjamat (al-khat al-sharif al-sultani),in Judeo-Arabic (Baghdad, 1908).

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Hebrew Printing in Baghdad