Bidspirit auction | (BIBLE,   Psalms). Sepher Tehilim.

(BIBLE,   Psalms). Sepher Tehilim. With commentary by David Kimchi (RaDa’K). Naples, Joseph ben Jacob Aschkenazi Gunzenhauser, 1487. A Wide-Margined Copy.   Biblical text in square type with Nikud. Kimchi’s commentary in rabbinic type without nikud. Edited by Jacob Baruch ben Judah Landau Aschkenazi. Formerly in The Library of the Valmadonna Trust. ff. 113 (of 118). Lacking the final blank (absent in most copies), ff. 1-3 and 7, all expertly reproduced in facsimile, including decorative initial word panel. ff. 4-6 mounted, most lower outer corners strengthened. Censored as expected, though prodigious (contemporary) efforts made to remove the censor’s erasures and render the text readable. Additional fragmentary portions of ff. 17-20 also included and loosely laid in place. Modern blind-tooled and paneled morocco, titles gilt on spine. Housed in custom slip-case. Folio. References: Vinograd, Naples 4; Steinschneider, col. 2, no. 6; Goff Heb-29; Thes. A-57; Offenberg 35; BMC XIII, p. 50; Iakerson 44; Stefansky, Sifrei Yesod i-18. This edition of Psalms, complete with R. David Kimchi’s commentary, was issued by Gunzenhauser the same year as several other volumes of Kethuvim. Joseph and Azriel Gunzenhauser, pioneers of Hebrew printing, settled in Naples from Gunzenhausen, Germany. In Naples they established a press, assembled a talented team of typesetters and proof-readers and between the years 1487-92 produced in sum, twelve books. This Naples edition of Psalms, Gunzenhauser`s first imprint, is also the first edition of Psalms to use nikud, (vocalized text accomplished through the addition of vowel points, accents, and diacritic marks) throughout the text. An earlier Hebrew edition of Psalms, printed in Bologna a decade earlier, only included nikud in a portion of the initial quire before abandoning the practice for the remainder of the volume. Indeed, the corrector of the present edition, Jacob Baruch ben Judah Landau, refers in the colophon to the difficulties of gaining an accurate vocalization. See: Treasures of the Valmadonna Trust Library - Otzroth Ya’akov, Incunables no. 26.