Italian Translations of Rieti’s Me’on ha-Shoalim

I would like to present at the Congress the very first results of the study I’m conducting about the Italian translations of the Me’on ha-shoalym. This research is part of the larger Franco-German project ANR about Moshe ben Yitzhak da Rieti (1388-ca.1465) and his Miqdash Me’at.

The Me’on ha-shoalym - the second chapter of the second section of the "Little Temple”- consists of 115 tercets and constitutes a separate part of the poem that maintains its own meaning even if considered individually with respect to the rest of the work. And thus, as an autonomous part, it has in fact been inserted in some mahzorim of the Roman rite and repeatedly translated into Italian.

Until now, we know of three printed versions of the text in Italian translation:

- Eli’ezer Matzliaḥ ben Avraham Kohen (Lazzaro da Viterbo), Venice, 1585 approximately

- Debora Ascarelli, Venice,1602

- Shemuel da Castelnovo, Venice,1609

And two manuscript versions:

The anonymous version in Oxford, Bodleian Library n° 2578
The manuscript version that we can find in five manuscripts, four in Hebrew characters and one in Latin characters.

After having provided a status quaestionis that enumerates and illustrates the various Italian translations existing both in print and in manuscript - distinguishing them chronologically where possible and dividing them between texts in Latin and Hebrew characters - I would continue exposing the textual work of transcription and analysis carried out so far and the criteria used, to finally dwell on the tradition of these translations. The attempt is in fact to reflect by inserting and comparing these translations within a literary and cultural context that is not only Jewish but also Italian.

Finally, I would like to try to understand why this specific chapter of the Miqdash Me’at has enjoyed particular fame, so much so that we are faced with the phenomenon of multiple translations of the same Hebrew text.