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Novellae on the Talmud by R. Masud ben Judah Darmon (צ'רמון Tsarmon). In the text of the detailed title page the author describes himself as young and writes that this work is on the gemara, perush Rashi, and Tosafot גפ"ת on entire or the majority of tractates, while others are brief selections and afterwards Kellai ha-Shas. The title page is dated, “nd the voice of the turtledove התור (5606 = 1846) is heard in our land” (Song of Songs 2:12). There is an introduction from R. Darmon and then text, which is set in two columns in rabbinic type, excepting headers and initial words. Gur Aryeh begins with Berakhot, followed by Pesahim, Ketubbot, Kiddushin, Gittin, Bava Kamma, Sanhedrin, Makkot, Shevu’ot, Pe’ah, Demai, Kilayim, Shabbat, Eruvin, Bezah, Yoma, Sukkah, Ta’anit, etc. After the tractates there is a long section on Maimonides’ Mishenh Torah.
R. Masud ben Judah Darmon (צ'רמון Tsarmon) was the scion of a distinguished North African family. R. Jacob ben Isaac Darmon (1460) was dayyan of Mahdia (Tunisia) and one of the main correspondents of R. Zemah ben Solomon Duran. R. Mordecai Darmon was a leading 17th-century merchant in Tunis, where the kabbalist R. Moses Darmon (d. 1741) was dayyan of the Leghorn community. R. Nehorai Darmon (1682–1760), talmudist, poet, and disciple of Isaac Lombroso, succeeded him. His literary works were destroyed when the Jewish and Christian houses were plundered by Algerian soldiers. What had been saved was published under the title Yeter ha-Baz (Leghorn, 1787). R. Mordecai Darmon, a wealthy scholar, was treasurer and adviser to the beys of Algeria before 1772. In 1783 he was sent on a diplomatic mission to Constantinople and later established the new Oran community for which he built a synagogue. He wrote Ma’amar Mordekhai (Leghorn, 1781). Among his son-in-laws was R. Masud ben Judah Darmon (Tsarmon), author of Gur Aryeh. Another Darmon, R. Victor (Hayyim) Darmon was Spain’s representative in Mazagan. As a result of a false testimony brought by the governor of the town, he was summarily executed (January 1844). The affair had wide repercussions in Europe and was one of the causes of the 1859–1860 Spanish-Moroccan war.
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