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Bidding Information
Lot #    6626
Auction End Date    2/10/2004 1:42:00 PM (mm/dd/yyyy)
          
Title Information
Title (English)    Likkutei Kadmoniyyot
Title (Hebrew)    לקוטי קדמוניות
Author    [Karaite] Simhah Pinsker
City    Vienna
Publisher    Adalbert della Torre
Publication Date    1860
          
Collection Information
Independent Item    This listing is an independent item not part of any collection
          
Description Information
Physical
Description		    [6], x, 234; [2], 228 pp., 210:130 mm., light age staining, wide margins. A very good copy bound in the original boards, split.
          
Detailed
Description		    First, most important, and influential work on the history of the Karaites and their literature by Simhah Pinsker. Likkutei Kadmoniyyot made such an impression upon the scholarly world that the historians Jost and Graetz publicly avowed their indebtedness to Pinsker, Jost even changing, in consequence, some of the views expressed in his history of Jewish sects. There are German and Hebrew title pages, a dedication to Pinsker’s father, R. Mordecai ha-Levi, and an introduction by Pinsker. The volume is in two parts; the second almost as extensive as the first, is described as an addendum. At the end are indexes of sages, of subjects, and errata. In Likkutei Kadmoniyyot, Pinsker attempts to show that Karaite scholars are due credit for the correct system of Biblical orthography, grammar, and lexicography; and that even in their poetry the Karaites were models for the Hebrew poets of the Middle Ages, such as Ibn Gabirol and Judah ha-Levi. These exaggerated ideas, arrived at under the influence of Firkovich, have been discredited. Nevertheless, Likkutei Kadmoniyyot remains of permanent value for Karaite studies due to the inclusion of copious extracts from hitherto unpublished Karaite works in Hebrew and Arabic.

Simhah Pinsker, (1801–1864) was born in Tarnow, Galicia and educated at home by his father, an eminent preacher (Maggid). He at first engaged in commerce, but lack of success induced him to move to Odessa, where he became secretary to the local rabbi. He also founded in 1826 the first successful modern Jewish school in Russia, in which he taught Hebrew language and literature. At the same time he published a series of learned papers in the periodical Orient, and when the famous Karaite savant Abraham Firkovich visited Odessa, Pinsker examined and described several of the ancient Hebrew manuscripts collected by him. His work eventually earned him gold medals from the Russian government and a pension from the Jewish community of Odessa. Relieved from the daily need to earn a living, Pinsker moved to Vienna in order to devote all of his time to research, and there in 1860 he published Likkutei Kadmoniyyot. Pinsker subsequently returned to Odessa where he died. Among Pinsker’s philological works are Mavo el ha-Nikkud ha-Ashuri o ha-Bavli, on the Babylonian Hebrew punctuation, with an appendix containing an annotated edition of Abraham ibn Ezra's Yesod Mispar (Vienna, 1863); and Mishlei ha-Gizrah ve-ha-Beniyyah, on mood and inflection of the Hebrew verb, edited posthumously by S. Rubin (Vienna, 1887).
          
Paragraph 2    לקורות דת בני מקרא והליטעראטור שלהם עפ"י כתבי יד עבריים וערביים, מאת שמחה פינסקער איש אודיסא...

Added t.p.: Lickute Kadmoniot. Zur Geschichte des Karaismus und der karaischen Literatur. Nach handschriftlichen Quellen bearbeitet von S. Pinsker... עי' הערות לספר, מאת אברהם שמידל, 1861 ,X ,MGWJ, עמ' 186-176, ואברהם גייגר, אוצר נחמד, ד, תרכ"ד, עמ' 36-8. "לקוטי קדמוניות... חלק שני" פרסם א"א הרכבי ב"זכרון לראשונים", חלק א, מחברת ח, פטרבורג תרס"ג, עיין: הרכבי, אברהם אליהו בן יעקב.

          
Reference
Description		    EJ; JE; Vin Vienna 1132; CD-EPI 0158039
        
Associated Images
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Listing Classification
Period
19th Century:    Checked
  
Location
Other:    Austria
  
Subject
History:    Checked
Other:    Karaite
  
Characteristic
First Editions:    Checked
Language:    Hebrew
  
Manuscript Type
  
Kind of Judaica