Paraliterary text: RNL Yevr. II C1

Description

An almost complete manuscript of the pentatueuch, with Sa'adya's Tafsīr and masoretic annotations, copied in the early years of the eleventh century. A series of colophons copied with slight changes in various places throughout the manuscript (at the begining and middle of each of the five books) document its transfer between several known and important figures. The first colophon is that of the copyist, Shemuel b. Yaʿaqōv, the known scribe active in the first dwo decades of the eleventh century in Fusṭāṭ, who was also the scribe behind the 'Leningrad Codex'. The manuscript's first owner was Shelomo ha-Paqid (the representative of the merchants) b. Avraham, active in Tyre in the early 11th century, and mentioned in several Geniza douments (see PGPID 1761). The second documented ownership of the manuscript is when the Head of the Court (Av Bet Din) Shelomo b. Eliyahu Kohen Gaon purchased it for his son, Ṣadōq, on 1084, in Tyre. This colophon (recurring throughout the manuscript) was written in Hebrew by ʿAmram b. Ṣedaqa, a known scribe in Tyre at the time (see for example PGPID 764, and further references there). The third ownership is that of "Sitt al-Kull Mubāraka, the daughter of the Gaon" - an unknown figure thus far. The fourth ownership colophon documents the owner as ʿOvadya b. ʿUlla "the honorable prince", who is the same ʿOvadya/ʿAbdallāh whose appointment as the leader of all Jewish communities in al-Shām in 1193 is documented in PGPID 9436. ʿOvadya's ancestry is detailed in the colophon for five generations, and some of his family members are known from Geniza documents and colophons from 12th century Egypt. See the family's lineage in PGPID 12713. All colophons transcribed here are from page 129 in the second volume, except the first and last colphons which are on the first and last pages of the manuscript, respectively. The fifth and last ownership colophon is written in Judao-Arabic. It bears the date 28th of Marḥeshvan 1598 Sel., which is 24.11.1286 (Nov 17 according to the converter). The person who purchased the manuscrupt was Abū Ṣāliḥ ha-Kohen, "pride of the scribes", son of Peraḥya the physician.