ZACUTO, ABRAHAM.

Sepher Yuchasin [“Book of ...

ZACUTO, ABRAHAM.

Sepher Yuchasin [“Book of Genealogies”: Onomasticon and history]. With printed glosses by R. Moshe Isserles (Rem’a). * Appended: Seder Olam Zuta.

FIRST EDITION with the Rema’s notes. 

Extensive marginal notes throughout. ff. 168. Mispaginated (as are all copies) but complete. Browned, ink from marginalia oxidized in places. Later full vellum. 4to.

Vinograd, Cracow 63.

Cracow, Isaac Prostitz, 1580-1.

The astronomer Abraham Zacuto (1452-c.1515) served at the court of Salamanca, and following the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492, became court astronomer in the service of King John II of Portugal. Zacuto’s astrolabe, tables and maritime charts were instrumental in Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama’s 1496 voyage to India.

Upon the expulsion of the Jews from Portugal in 1497, Zacuto took up residence in Tunis where he worked on his history, Sepher Yuchasin. Zacuto often differs with the findings of his predecessors, R. Sherira Gaon, Abraham ibn Daud Halevi (author Sepher HaKabbalah), and Maimonides. Though the work takes the reader from the Biblical Adam to the author’s day, scholars have noted that the main contribution of the author are his original - and at times controversial - interpretations of several events during the Second Temple and Talmudic eras. (See EJ, Vol. XVI, cols. 903-6).

Seder Olam Zuta (“The Small Seder Olam”) - not to be confused with Seder Olam Rabbah (“The Great Seder Olam”), composed by the Mishnaic Tanna Yosé ben Chalafta - is an historical record that traces successive generations of Babylonian exilarchs from the year 166 (counting from the destruction of the Second Temple) until the year 452 when Mar Zutra migrated to the Land of Israel and became head of the Sanhedrin. There is much dissension among scholars as to when this invaluable chronicle was originally penned.