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Palṭiel: a Note

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2009

Bernard Lewis
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Extract

A good deal of effort and ingenuity has been devoted to the problem of establishing the historical identity of Palṭiel, an enigmatic figure in the eleventhcentury chronicle of Ahima'as. In this work, the author relates what purports to be the history of his family over the previous two centuries and gives pride of place to one Palṭiel ben Shefaṭyah, an astrologer who rose to high office under the Fṭimid Caliph al-Mu'izz in Tunisia and Egypt. The family, according to Ahima'aṣ, had lived in Oria, in southern Italy, for generations. Then came the Fṭimid raids on the Italian mainland. With al-Mu'izz as their commander, 'they devastated the entire province of Calabria, and reached Oria, on the borders of Apulia; they besieged it, defeated all its forces; so that the city was

Type
Notes and Communications
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , February 1967 , pp. 177 - 181
Copyright
Copyright School of Oriental and African Studies 1967

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References

1 The chronicle of Aḥima' aṣ was first published by Neubauer, A., from the unique manuscript in the Toledo cathedral library, in his Mediaeval Jewish chronicles (Anecdota Oxoniensia, Semitic Series, 1, 6), Oxford, 1895, 11132Google Scholar, and reprinted by Kahana, A., Sifrut ha-historiya ha-yisra'elit, Warsaw, 1922, I, 11340Google Scholar. A critical edition, with English translation, was published by Salzmann, M., The chronicle of Ahimaaz, New York, 1924Google Scholar, and another, with extensive annotations, by Klar, B., Megillat Aḥima'as, Jerusalem, 1941Google Scholar. References are to the two last-named editions. The work was analysed by Kaufmann, D., Die Chronik des Achimaaz von Oria (8501054), MGWJ, XL, NS, IV, 1896, 46273,Google Scholar 496509, 529554. Cf. idem, Beitrge zur Geschichte gyptens aus jdischen Quellen ZDMG, LI, 1897, 43642.Google Scholar

2 Salzmann's translation, 88; text, 16. Klar, 38.

3 Salzmann's translation, 89; text, 17. Klar, 39. Salzmann's rendering: He (Paltiel) entered his service as his vizier introduces an Arabic technical term not present in the Hebrew text.

4 Text and translation, with discussion, in Marx, A., Studies in Gaonic history and literature, in JQR, NS, I, 1910 1911, 7982.Google ScholarOn the Sefer ḥasidim, ascribed to Judah b. Samuel of Regensburg (c. 1200), see Waxman, M., A history of Jewish literature. Second ed., I, New York, 1938,3604. The text is given by B. Klar, 5961; a brief excerpt is cited in B. Dinur Diinaburg, Toledot Yisra'el, v, Yisra'el ba-gola, revised edition, I, Tel Aviv, n.d. (preface dated 1958), 867.Google Scholar

5 Latin Uria, Greek pa, Hebrew , Arabic Wr (). On variant Hebrew forms see Klar, 160.

6 J enc., s.v. Oria.

7 The raid on Oria is briefly described by Ibn 'Idhri, under the year 313925 (Histoire al-Bayn al-mughrib. Nouvelle d., ed. Colin, G. S. and Levi-Provencal, R., I, Leiden, 1948, 190Google Scholar; Amari, M., Biblioteca arabo-sicula, Leipzig, 1857, 367;Google Scholar Italian translation, II Turin and Rome, 1881, 278), and is mentioned in Christian sources. Cf. Amari, M., Storia dei musulmani in Sicilia, revised edition, II, Catania, 1935, 2014.Google Scholar

8 On Jewish casualties see Klar, 168. Among those captured was the physician Shabbetay Donnolo (91382), whose account is cited by Klar, 59. See Graetz, , Geschichte der Juden, v, Leipzig, 1871, 31618; and J enc., s.v. DonnoloGoogle Scholar

9 Klar, 168; Mann, J., Texts and studies, I, Cincinnati, 1931, 14Google Scholar; Amari, , Storia, II, 3701;Google Scholar Kaufmann, Die Chronik, 529 ff. Cf. Cassuto, U., Una lettera ebraica, Giornale della Soc. As. It., XXIX, 1918 1920, 1034, arguing that Paltiel was in fact captured in the raid of 925, and that the mention of al-Mu'izz is due to an error of the chronicler.Google Scholar

10 Marx, Studies, 83.

11 Dinur, 109, n. 39. On this document see below, 181.

12 As Aḥima'as himself remarks: his eminence and power are recorded in the chronicles of the kingdom of Nof and Anamim. Salzmann's translation, 95; text, 20; Klar, 45. Nof and Anamim are names of Egypt (cf. Genesis x, 13; Isaiah xix, 13; Ezekiel xxx, 13, 16; 1 Chronicles i, 11).

13 de Goeje, M. J., Djauhar = Palṭl, in ZDMG, LII, 1896, 7580.Google Scholar

14 A. Marx, Studies, 7885.

15 D. Kaufmann, Die Chronik, 536.

16 Fischel, W. J., Jews in the economic and political life of mediaeval Islam, London, 1937, 648.Google Scholar

17 The whole question has been re-examined by Neustadt Ayalon, D., Inyene negidut be-Misrayyim, Zion, IV, 1939, 13543Google Scholar, and more briefly, by Klar, 16970, and by H. Z. J. W. Hirschberg, Toledot ha-Yehudim be-Afriqa ha-ṣefonit, I, Jerusalem, 1965, 734, 152 ff., 346, and 363. See also J enc., s.v. Paltiel.

18 ḥasan ḥusn 'al-Wahhb, Abd, Waraqt 'an al-ḥaḍra al-'arabiyya bi-lfrqiya, Tunis, 1965, 3014.Google Scholar

19 Variously written Al-'zar, Al'azr and Al'ayzr in the Arabic texts. The Hebrew may be either Elazar or Eliezer.

20 Ibn al-Qifṭ Ta'rkh al-ḥukam', ed. J. Lippert, Leipzig, 1903, 320; Uṣaybi'a, Ibn Ab, Tabaqt al-aṭibb, II, Cairo, 1882, 86Google Scholar. The latter includes some account of later members of his family. See also Leclerc, L., Histoire de la mdicine arabe, I, Paris, 1876, 4034Google Scholar; Steinschneider, M., Die arabische Literatur der Juden, Frankfurt, 1902, 967Google Scholar; and Poznanski, S., Die jdischen Artikel in Ibn al-Qifti's Gelehrtenlexikon, MGWJ, XLIX, NS, xix, 1905, 489.Google Scholar

21 They include a pharmacopoeia, works on the cough, on the true nature of science, and on antidotes.

22 Maqrz, Itti'ẓ al-ḥunaf', ed. Bunz, Leipzig, 1909, 95; ed. Shayyal, Cairo, 1948, 196.

23 Ivanow, Ed. W., Srat al-ḥjib Ja'far, Bull. Fac. Arts. Univ. of Egypt, IV, 2, 1936, 10733Google Scholar; English translation in Ivanow, W., Ismaili tradition concerning the rise of the Fatimids, London and Bombay, 1942, 184223. On the book and its author, see Ivanow, Ismaili tradition, 1011. The passage in question occurs in the text at p. 110, in the translation at pp. 18990.Google Scholar

24 Balad al-Rm. Ivanow translates the (former) Byzantine possessions in Africa, where he conquered a large town called Wr. The insertion of the words former and in Africa, which are not in the original, and the concealment of Oria under its Arabic name, no doubt helped to obscure the significance of this passage.

25 The letter is preserved in Ab 'Al Manṣr al-'Azz, Srat al-, ed. Muhammad Kmil ḥusayn and 'Umar 'Abd al-Hd , Cairo, n.d. 1954, 108; Frenchtranslation by Canard, M., Vie de l'Ustadh Jaudhar, Algiers, 1958, 1623.Google Scholar

26 Sawirus ibn al-Muqaffa', History of the Patriarchs of the Egyptian Church, ed. A. S. Atiy, 'Abd al-Masḥ and O. H. E. Burmester, II, 2, Cairo, 1948, 13740, text 924; Leroy, L., Histoire d'Abraham le syrien, ROC, XIV, 1909, 3824, 3924Google Scholar. Cf. Mann, J., The Jews in Egypt and in Palestine under the Fatimid Caliphs, I, Oxford, 1920, 1718, where the Ms of the story is identified with Ms b. El'zr.Google Scholar

27 ṭabaqt, II, 86.

28 Itti'Ẓ, ed. Bunz, 97, ed. Shayyal, 199.

29 Gottheil, R., An eleventh-century document concerning a Cairo synagogue, JQR, XIX, 1907, 467539CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. Mann, , History, I, 834, who identifies the family as the descendants of Ms, b. El'zr. A partial Hebrew translation of the document by L. Kopf was published by B. Dinur (op. cit. 956).Google Scholar