Physical Description

Scroll: Cloth backed scroll with printed text on brown wooden rollers housed in a gray cloth covered canister with a red leather label with gold lettering. Scroll length approximately fourteen feet. 

Detail Description

This is 333 of 500 numbered copies. The original manuscript is a profusely illustrated "Ha-Melekh" scroll. The "Kaniel Megillah" is an illuminated manuscript with an illustration on the opening pull and has illustrations reflecting the story both above and below the text blocks which are set within a illustrations of columns. The text and illustrations continue along as if one were viewing an arcade. There are no known examples of illuminated Esther scrolls from before the sixteenth century. It is unclear whether there were earlier scrolls but there was some precedent in the ways in which the subject matter could be handled provided by Purim related illustrations in illuminated prayer books. However, with the onset of printing the illuminated Esther Scroll became a popular subject and different approaches to the subject appeared. The Kaniel scroll combined aspects of the different approaches. The illustrations are tied closely to the text that they frame. Though the work is not dated specifically it is likely from the 1740s or 1750s.

Reference Description