Medieval Hebrew Manuscripts Reused as Book-Bindings in Italy: European Genizah Texts and Studies, Volume 6

This richly illustrated volume offers the most comprehensive and updated survey on about sixteen thousand Hebrew manuscript fragments reused as book-bindings and preserved in hundreds of libraries and archives in Italy. Contributions by the leading scholars in the field elucidate specific collections and genres no less than individual fragments, bringing to new life a forgotten library of medieval Jewish books, as almost 160 Talmudic codices, which include the Mishna, Tosefta, Palestinian Talmud and, for the most part, the Babylonian one, and several hitherto unknown texts. The contribution of these fragments to the ongoing research on the ＂European Genizah＂, as the Books within Books Project, and to Jewish Studies in general cannot be overestimated.

Mauro Perani, Ph.D. h.c. by the Hebrew University, was full professor of Hebrew at the Bologna University until 2019 and has served as director and editor of the Associazione Italiana per lo Studio del Giudaismo’s review Materia giudaica since 2000. In 2008 he founded the Corpus Epithaphiorum Hebraicorum Italiae book series. He has published dozens of books and hundreds of articles on themes pertaining to Judaism. His publications can be found on the website https: //unibo.academia.edu/MauroPerani.