Bidspirit auction | Manuscript, Dutch Siddur – Dutch

Manuscript, Dutch Siddur – Dutch Spanish-Portuguese Rite – Late 17th or Early 18th Century – Original Leather Binding - Manuscript volume, weekday and festival siddur, in Dutch translation, following the rite of the Spanish-Portuguese community in the Netherlands. [The Netherlands, late 17th or early 18th century]. Dutch, neat scribal writing, in cursive script. The siddur comprises prayers for weekdays, Shabbat, the three festivals, Purim and Hanukkah, fast days, Kiddush HaChodesh and Kiddush Levanah, psalms from Tehillim, and various blessings. Includes detailed instructions and references to the segments of the prayer service in other places in the siddur. Table of contents at end. Original leather binding, inscribed with symmetric decorations, with an original pair of brass clasps. The present manuscript is an important and early attestation of a Dutch translation of the prayer service in the Sephardic-Portuguese rite. It precedes the first printed Dutch translation of the siddur by nearly a century (Gebeden der Portugeesche Jooden, The Hague, 1791-1793), which was published by the disciples of R. Tzaddik Cohen Belinfante (1732-1786). The manuscript copy of the siddur appears to point to the small target audience who prayed and studied in Dutch at the time, making its printing financially unrewarding. This may moreover reflect a desire to conceal the prayer rite from outsiders. The scholar and bibliographer Sigmund Seeligmann, writing in the Dutch periodical De Vrijdagavond (XXXIX, 27 December 1929, p. 196), describes the present manuscript: ”I recently purchased a valuable manuscript from the Nijhoff company in The Hague (Catalogue 62, no. 463), which is a Dutch translation of the Hebrew prayer service according to the Portuguese rite. Based on the script, it may be dated ca. 1700, if not earlier”. Seeligmann refers to two other similar manuscripts with translations of the siddur based on the Spanish-Portuguese rite: one was auctioned as part of the collection of Dr. D. H. de Castro (Amsterdam, 1899, no. 536), where it is described as a Dutch translation of the year-round prayers from 1663; and the second is mentioned as a Sephardic prayer book, Amsterdam 1751, in the catalogue of the H. A. Wagenaar library (Amsterdam, 1904, no. 2337). The Ets Haim and Rosenthaliana libraries in Amsterdam record three more siddurim of this type, which were copied by hand over the course of the 18th century (see: L. Fuks & R. G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Catalogue of the Manuscripts of the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana, Leiden, 1973, nos. 196a, 196b; and: L. Fuks & R. G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Catalogue of the Manuscripts of Ets Haim, Leiden, 1975, no. 92). 250, [1] pages. 16.5 cm. Good condition. Stains and minor defects. Inscriptions on endpapers. Bookplates. Gilt edges. Original leather binding, with pair of brass clasps. Provenance: 1. Martinus Nijhoff, Catalogue 62, Lot 463. 2. Collection of Sigmund Seeligmann. 3. Collection of Mozes Heiman Gans.