(Jewish Telegraphic Agency Mail Service)
The collection of rare Hebrew manuscripts, first editions and incunabula left to the Hungarian Academy of Science by the late Professor David Kaufmann, who died in 1899, has been completely catalogued and is now open here at the Library of the Academy of Science.
The collection includes a number of priceless illustrated Haggadahs, Torah rolls and works of great importance as sources of Jewish history in the Middle Ages, especially in Hungary.
The exhibits have been carefully arranged in accordance with the catalogue of the collection which was drawn up during Prof. Kaufmann’s lifetime. The arrangement of the collection is now so complete that it is already possible to send loan exhibitions from the collection abroad. Two important manuscripts have been sent to the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and one manuscript has been loaned to America.
Professor Kaufmann, who refused the offer of a professorship at the Jewish Theological Seminary in Cincinnati, preferring to accept instead the Chairs of History, Philosophy of Religion and Homiletics at the Budapest Rabbinical Seminary, a post which he held until his death, had in his library manuscripts of the first importance, incunabula and first editions, of which the Marco Mortara Library, which he acquired, formed the nucleus. As librarian of the Budapest Rabbinical Seminary he acquired the large library of Lelio della Torre of Padua, the library of the Seminary becoming by this addition one of the most valuable Hebrew libraries of Europe.
The bibliography of Prof. Katafmann’s works compiled by M. Brann in 1900 includes 546 items covering nearly every branch of Jewish science. His chief works included a survey of the Jewish and Arabic religious philosophy of the Middle Ages, “History of Jewish Religious Philosophy in the Middle Ages from Saddiah to Maimon,” “The Last Expulsion of the Jews from Vienna,” “The Families of Prague, According to the Epitaphs in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Prague,” “Dr. Israel Conegliano and his Services to the Republic of Venice,” “The History of Art in the Synagogues,” the “History of Jewish Manuscript Illustration, etc.”
Prof. Kaufmann was an active member of the Mekize Nirdamim, a society for the publication of old Hebrew manuscripts.
Julius Rosenwald has donated $30,000 to be used by Prof. James II. Breasted in digging up and translating the inscriptions on the tombs of the Pharoahs of Egypt, it was announced by the board of trustees of the University of Chicago.
Prof. Breasted is now directing research work in the Valley of the Kings.
The Jewish Historical Society of Illinois has been extended an official invitation to participate in the festivities of the Sesqut-centennial Exposition in Philadelphia which is to take place this summer. The Jewish community of Philadelphia is to be host to the delegation that will come from the Historical Society.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
