Meshullam da Volterra

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Meshullam ben Menahem da Volterra was an Italian-Jewish merchant and traveler from Florence in the 15th century. Meshullam came from a Jewish family in the Tuscan city ​​of Volterra and ran an important gemstone trade in Florence with his father Menahem ben Aaron da Volterra .

The da Volterra family were among the wealthiest families in town and owned extensive estates near Florence. It is reported, for example, that Meshullam was a close friend of Lorenzo de 'Medici (1449–1492), with whom he had a private correspondence and occasionally gave him self-killed game as a gift.

Trip to Palestine

The route of Meshullam ben Menahem in 1481.
View of the city of Rhodes by Hartmann Schedel , Nuremberg 1493.
City view of Alexandria by Hartmann Schedel, Nuremberg 1493.
City view of Jerusalem by Hartmann Schedel, Nuremberg 1493.

In 1481 Meshullam went on a business or pilgrimage to Palestine , which took him to Jerusalem via Rhodes , Alexandria , Cairo , Gaza and Hebron .

Meschullam prepared a detailed and factual travel report about his trip, in which he describes the cities visited, the cityscapes, ports, buildings and defenses, their population and economic conditions.

He describes, for example, the city of Rhodes to be exceptionally beautiful city and specifically mentions the impressive fortifications that were built in a relatively short time after it earlier, during only one year siege of 1480 by the Ottoman army Sultan Mehmed II. , Badly damaged had been.

In Alexandria he is fascinated by the water supply and urban drainage system . He reports that each house has two cisterns , one for drinking water , which is fed by the annual flooding of the Nile , and another for sewage . The city of Alexandria was to a certain extent undermined by the large number of cisterns.

Meschullam gives a high proportion of the report to the situation of the Jewish population in these cities. It describes the respective Jewish communities , the number of Jewish families living there and their social status . He compares in detail the degree of social integration and the various religious practices of the individual communities.

The travelogue of Meshullam ben Menahem da Volterra is considered to be one of the most informative mediaeval sources on Jewish life in the countries of the Eastern Mediterranean . It ends with Meshullam's return to Italy on October 19, 1481, the day of his arrival in Venice .

The manuscript in Hebrew is now in the holdings of the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in Florence. It was first published in 1881 by the Italian Judaist David Castelli. A first annotated German translation of the travelogue was published in 2012.

expenditure

  • Daniel Jütte (transl.): Meshullam da Volterra: From Tuscany to the Orient: A Renaissance businessman on the move. Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, Göttingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-525-30035-0 (German)
  • Alessandra Veronese (translator): Mesullam da Volterra. Viaggio in Terra d'Israele . Rimini 1989 (Italian)
  • José Ramón Nom de Deu (transl.): Relatos de viajes y epistolas de peregrinos judíos a Jerusalén (1481–1523) . Sabadell 1987, pp. 41-94 (Spanish)
  • Avraham Yaari (ed.): Massa Meshullam mi-Volterra be-Eretz Yisraelbi-shenat 1481 . Jerusalem 1948.
  • Elkan Nathan Adler : Jewish Travelers. New York 1930, Routledge, Abingdon 2004, ISBN 0-415-34466-2 , pp. 156–208 (partial English translation)

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Léon Poliakov : Jewish bankers and the Holy See from the thirteenth to the seventeenth century . Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd, London 1977, p. 124, ISBN 0-7100-8256-8
  2. ^ Stefan Schröder: Between Christianity and Islam: Cultural boundaries in the late medieval pilgrimage reports of Felix Fabri . Akademie Verlag, Berlin 2009, p. 260, ISBN 978-3-05-004534-4
  3. ↑ Haim Hillel Ben-Sasson (ed.): History of the Jewish people: From the beginnings to the present . C. H. Beck, Munich 2007, p. 699 f, ISBN 978-3-406-55918-1
  4. ^ Lettera di viaggio di Rabbi Mešullam figlio del nostro onorato maestro Rabbi Menaḥem di Volterra dell 'anno 1481 . In: Abraham Moses Luncz : Jerusalem. Yearbook for the promotion of a scientifically accurate knowledge of the present and the old Palestine . Volume 1, Vienna 1882, pp. 166-219
  5. ↑ Daniel Jütte (. Hg./Üb): Meshullam da Volterra; From Tuscany to the Orient. A traveling Renaissance merchant . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2012, ISBN 978-3-525-30035-0
personal data
SURNAME Meshullam da Volterra
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Meshullam de Volterra; Meshullam from Volterra; Meshullam ben Menahem; Meshullam ben Menahem da Volterra
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian-Jewish merchant and traveler
DATE OF BIRTH 15th century
PLACE OF BIRTH Tuscany
DATE OF DEATH 15th century or 16th century