- Department of Special and Area Studies Collections
208 Smathers Library
(Judaica Suite)
PO Box 117005
Gainesville, FL 32611-7005 - 352-273-2865
- University of Florida, Jewish Studies, Faculty Memberadd
- I am the Curator of the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica at the University of Florida, and a Joint Faculty memb... moreI am the Curator of the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica at the University of Florida, and a Joint Faculty member of the Center for Jewish Studies. My personal research focuses on the history and provenance of collections, primarily the Cairo Genizah. My book "The Cairo Genizah and the Age of Discovery in Egypt: the History and Provenance of a Jewish Archive" (I. B. Tauris, 2022) is available at: https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/cairo-genizah-and-the-age-of-discovery-in-egypt-9781788319652/. I am currently researching aspects of Solomon Aaron Wertheimer's manuscript sales, Moses Shapira's manuscript sales, Elkan Nathan Adler's collecting activities, and all things related to Count Riamo d'Hulst.edit
The Cairo Genizah is considered one of the world's greatest Hebrew manuscript treasures. Yet the story of how over a quarter of a million fragments hidden in Egypt were discovered and distributed around the world, before becoming... more
The Cairo Genizah is considered one of the world's greatest Hebrew manuscript treasures. Yet the story of how over a quarter of a million fragments hidden in Egypt were discovered and distributed around the world, before becoming collectively known as “The Cairo Genizah,” is far more complex than previously told. The full story involves an international cast of scholars, librarians, archaeologists, excavators, collectors, dealers and agents, operating from the mid-nineteenth to the early twentieth century, and all acting with varying motivations and intentions in a race for the spoils.
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The provenance of many objects once part of the acclaimed Revd William MacGregor collection of Egyptian artefacts is unclear or unknown. Private collectors purchased pieces from the MacGregor collection when it was sold at auction in... more
The provenance of many objects once part of the acclaimed Revd William MacGregor collection of Egyptian artefacts is unclear or unknown. Private collectors purchased pieces from the MacGregor collection when it was sold at auction in 1922, many of which eventually made their way into major museums around the world. Today, the provenance information attached to them can usually be traced back through the private owners only as far as MacGregor’s ownership and no further. Recent research has revealed more about MacGregor’s collecting habits, including the fact that Count Riamo d’Hulst was the supplier of MacGregor’s famous obsidian head. Based on a little-known court case in Egypt and previously unseen correspondence between MacGregor and the Swiss archaeologist Édouard Naville, this article sheds further light on the extent to which the count was MacGregor’s regular supplier. It will also demonstrate how this key buyer–seller relationship developed, and how it eventually deteriorated into enmity and legal wrangling.
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In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, thousands of Cairo Genizah fragments came into the possession of western institutions and private collectors through the activities of individuals trading in, from, and through Palestine. The... more
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, thousands of Cairo Genizah fragments came into the possession of western institutions and private collectors through the activities of individuals trading in, from, and through Palestine. The Palestine antiquities trade has long been overlooked or ignored as any sort of factor in considering the origins and chain of custody for fragments labeled as from “The Cairo Genizah.” This article aims to redress that imbalance by examining the activities of twenty-one individuals involved in this trade. This first exploration of the connection between the Palestine Antiquities trade and the Cairo Genizah will further demonstrate the importance of provenance tracing.
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The following article examines the Revd Greville John Chester’s activities in the Egyptian antiquities trade from 1889 to 1892, specifically his involvement in discovering and distributing Hebrew manuscripts from the now famous Cairo... more
The following article examines the Revd Greville John Chester’s activities in the Egyptian antiquities trade from 1889 to 1892, specifically his involvement in discovering and distributing Hebrew manuscripts from the now famous Cairo Genizah. Based on letters written by Chester to the Bodleian Librarian, E.W.B. Nicholson, as well as other supporting documentary evidence, this investigation provides insights into the early history of the Cairo Genizah manuscripts before Solomon Schechter’s celebrated ‘discovery’ of them in 1896/97. Overall, this article shows that the provenance story of ‘the Cairo Genizah’ is multi-faceted and needs to be subjected to much greater scrutiny.
https://doi.org/10.1093/jhc/fhy023
https://doi.org/10.1093/jhc/fhy023
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The discovery and relocation of genizah material is a multi-layered and complex story. This article re-examines, to the extent possible given the current available evidence, the discovery and distribution of Cairo genizah manuscripts in... more
The discovery and relocation of genizah material is a multi-layered and complex story. This article re-examines, to the extent possible given the current available evidence, the discovery and distribution of Cairo genizah manuscripts in the late nineteenth century by taking a closer look at known historical accounts in conjunction with some lesser-known contemporary reports. Much provenance and provenience history was lost or destroyed during the course of multiple relocations and reorganizations of these materials; thus, this article emphasizes the need to pay greater attention to the multifaceted history of the Cairo manuscripts, and the need to be more circumspect when using an "across-the-board" term like "the Cairo Genizah." Such a label can prevent us from truly appreciating the breadth of Jewish material culture in Cairo in all its varied manifestations over time. More detailed provenance history for the genizah manuscripts will increase our knowledge about how culture is transmitted and how attitudes towards the preservation of Jewish cultural heritage have evolved.
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Studies in Semitic Linguistics and Manuscripts: A Liber Discipulorum in Honour of Professor Geoffrey Khan (Studia Semitica Upsaliensia 30), Edited by Nadia Vidro, Ronny Vollandt, Esther-Miriam Wagner and Judith Olszowy-Schlanger.... more
Studies in Semitic Linguistics and Manuscripts: A Liber Discipulorum in Honour of Professor Geoffrey Khan (Studia Semitica Upsaliensia 30), Edited by Nadia Vidro, Ronny Vollandt, Esther-Miriam Wagner and Judith Olszowy-Schlanger. University of Uppsala Press, Uppsala, 2018.
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When Solomon Schechter published his opus magnum, the co-edited volume of The Wisdom of Ben Sira, in 1899, he took the trouble to express his gratitude towards one Reginald Q. Henriques for his help in the past and still ongoing. This... more
When Solomon Schechter published his opus magnum, the co-edited volume of The Wisdom of Ben Sira, in 1899, he took the trouble to express his gratitude towards one Reginald Q. Henriques for his help in the past and still ongoing. This article attempts to answer the question: who was this Mr. Henriques and what was the nature of his connection to Schechter? Using previously unpublished archival evidence, this question is explored in depth, as well as the question of why Schechter chose to acknowledge this individual precisely at that point. It also provides an in-depth account, together with transcriptions of original letters, of the activities of the various genizah manuscript collectors operating in Cairo during the late 1890s and the unspoken race to recover the original Hebrew version of the Book of Ben Sira. These activities are viewed against the backdrop of an all-pervasive scholarly culture that was critical of post-biblical Judaism, as well as prevailing Cairene attitudes and behaviors towards those engaged in the recovery and export of antiquities, and the varying (often arbitrary) authorizations and restrictions exercised by Cairo’s European and Egyptian administrators. Finally, it takes a closer look at the contents of today’s Taylor-Schechter Genizah Collection at Cambridge University Library in an attempt to discover greater details about its exact provenance. Link to article: https://ajlpublishing.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1212&context=jl
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The Cambridge Inventory Project, sponsored by the Friedberg Genizah Project and carried out by a number of researchers at the Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit, was the first attempt to provide accurate information regarding the size... more
The Cambridge Inventory Project, sponsored by the Friedberg Genizah Project and carried out by a number of researchers at the Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit, was the first attempt to provide accurate information regarding the size and classification of the more than 193,000 Genizah manuscript fragments held at Cambridge University Library. Prior to this project, no authoritative list of valid shelf marks was available, nor was it known how many fragments were classified under any one shelf mark. The provision of such data and the creation of a searchable database were essential for the planning and implementation of a future digitization project. This article not only describes the ensuing Inventory Project, it also uses the project’s findings, together with additional information in previously unseen archives, to provide a new history of how these collections were formed over time.
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To celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica at the University of Florida, the Price Library launched the first stage of a project to digitize an important, special collection of anniversary... more
To celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica at the University of Florida, the Price Library launched the first stage of a project to digitize an important, special collection of anniversary editions of Jewish newspapers from around the world. This article provides the history of the collection, need for this project, steps involved in digitization and digital collection building, and future events based on the feedback to the initial project, which will include outreach, subsequent individual and collaborative digital collection development projects, online exhibits, and more.
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The discovery of the Cairo Genizah manuscripts (over 200,000 fragmentary texts, mainly written in Hebrew and Arabic) in the late-nineteenth century is an enigmatic tale. The early collectors of this material, unaware of its exact... more
The discovery of the Cairo Genizah manuscripts (over 200,000 fragmentary texts, mainly written in Hebrew and Arabic) in the late-nineteenth century is an enigmatic tale. The early collectors of this material, unaware of its exact provenance or keen to safeguard their access to it, did not divulge their sources. However, a selection of unpublished letters preserved in the Bodleian Library, in the archives of the Egypt Exploration Society and in the National Archives help piece together more of the story which will be revealed here for the first time. The letters concern the unacknowledged role of the mysterious Count d'Hulst in the recovery of sections of the Oxford Genizah collection; the race between two eminent scholars, Adolf Neubauer and Solomon Schechter, to discover the missing manuscript leaves of the original Hebrew Ecclesiasticus and the unspoken competition between the Libraries of Oxford and Cambridge to expand their Oriental collections.
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Presentation for the conference "Maimonides from Cordoba to Cairo: A Journey through Time and Knowledge," October 3-4, 2021, hosted by the Drop of Milk Association and The Jewish Community in Cairo: https://youtu.be/l_RifpMeeC8
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Paper presented at the FAU Gimelstob Symposium in Judaic Studies: Jewish History & Culture: New Insights from Florida Scholars, January 28-29, 2018. An expanded version of a talk given for the IXe journée d’études doctorales en... more
Paper presented at the FAU Gimelstob Symposium in Judaic Studies: Jewish History & Culture: New Insights from Florida Scholars, January 28-29, 2018. An expanded version of a talk given for the IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques
Mardi 5 décembre, 2017.
Mardi 5 décembre, 2017.
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Presentation given at the FAU Gimelstob Symposium in Judaic Studies: Jewish History & Culture: New Insights from Florida Scholars, January 28-29, 2018. An expanded version of a talk first given for the IXe journée d’études doctorales en... more
Presentation given at the FAU Gimelstob Symposium in Judaic Studies: Jewish History & Culture: New Insights from Florida Scholars, January 28-29, 2018. An expanded version of a talk first given for the IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques
Mardi 5 décembre, 2017.
Mardi 5 décembre, 2017.
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La matérialité de l’écrit dans le monde juif IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques dans le cadre du séminiare de Judith Schlanger - Saprat La IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et... more
La matérialité de l’écrit dans le monde juif
IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques
dans le cadre du séminiare de Judith Schlanger - Saprat
La IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques s’intéressera aux manuscrits comme objets. Supports, mise en page, mise en texte des écrits du monde juif : ces questionnements classiques méritaient un état des lieux.
9e JD affiche
Pendant la journée, nous suivrons les étapes de la production de l’écrit et de ses usages, du matériau brut à l’objet final. Les interventions porteront sur une analyse des supports de l’écrit et des contextes de production. L’étude portera également sur les savoir-faire techniques des scribes et les déplacements de l’écrit dans le monde juif.
Mardi 5 décembre à l'INHA, salle Vasari
IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques
dans le cadre du séminiare de Judith Schlanger - Saprat
La IXe journée d’études doctorales en paléographie et diplomatique hébraïques s’intéressera aux manuscrits comme objets. Supports, mise en page, mise en texte des écrits du monde juif : ces questionnements classiques méritaient un état des lieux.
9e JD affiche
Pendant la journée, nous suivrons les étapes de la production de l’écrit et de ses usages, du matériau brut à l’objet final. Les interventions porteront sur une analyse des supports de l’écrit et des contextes de production. L’étude portera également sur les savoir-faire techniques des scribes et les déplacements de l’écrit dans le monde juif.
Mardi 5 décembre à l'INHA, salle Vasari
This is an unedited draft copy of the paper that was presented at the Association of Jewish Libraries Annual Conference.
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This is the PowerPoint presentation that accompanied the paper "Uncovering the History of the Cairo Genizah Manuscript Collections: the Story so Far" delivered at the Association of Jewish Libraries Annual Conference, June 2013
This paper focuses on the ongoing research being carried out by Rebecca Jefferson on the history of the Cairo Genizah manuscript collections. Since 2008, Jefferson has been examining letters and documents held in various libraries around... more
This paper focuses on the ongoing research being carried out by Rebecca Jefferson on the history of the Cairo Genizah manuscript collections. Since 2008, Jefferson has been examining letters and documents held in various libraries around the world to uncover the story behind the discovery of the Cairo Genizah. These archives have revealed fascinating tidbits about the main protagonists, Solomon Schechter, Elkan Nathan Adler and Adolf Neubauer, as well as the back story of a shadowy nobleman, Count Riamo d'Hulst. Jefferson will outline the discoveries so far, providing examples from previously unseen letters, and she will discuss the challenges of this research and the problems ahead. The recording starts with the session already in progress. Presented by Rebecca Jefferson at the 2013 AJL Conference in Houston, TX.
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Co-authored with Laurie N. Taylor, Haven Hawley, Ben Walker, Valrie Davies, Chelsea Dinsmore and Suzan Alter Academic libraries and teaching departments sometimes treat Digital Humanities (DH) as radically new. While DH is radically new... more
Co-authored with Laurie N. Taylor, Haven Hawley, Ben Walker, Valrie Davies, Chelsea Dinsmore and Suzan Alter
Academic libraries and teaching departments sometimes treat Digital Humanities (DH) as radically new. While DH is radically new in terms of collaborative practices and methods, it is also fundamentally rooted in the humanities and intricately connected to core activities by librarians, especially for collaboration. This chapter explains how the UF Smathers Libraries leveraged the library digital collections—with rich technical features and content, and a robust underlying infrastructure—to create the necessary scholarly cyberinfrastructure to then support the DH community for an environment of radical collaboration. To do so, UF librarians undertook new DH activities as opportunities to fundamentally enrich and improve existing, seemingly more traditional work, including collection development, library scholarly councils, collaboration among libraries for print and digital collections, outreach and instruction, and more.
Academic libraries and teaching departments sometimes treat Digital Humanities (DH) as radically new. While DH is radically new in terms of collaborative practices and methods, it is also fundamentally rooted in the humanities and intricately connected to core activities by librarians, especially for collaboration. This chapter explains how the UF Smathers Libraries leveraged the library digital collections—with rich technical features and content, and a robust underlying infrastructure—to create the necessary scholarly cyberinfrastructure to then support the DH community for an environment of radical collaboration. To do so, UF librarians undertook new DH activities as opportunities to fundamentally enrich and improve existing, seemingly more traditional work, including collection development, library scholarly councils, collaboration among libraries for print and digital collections, outreach and instruction, and more.
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During the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Jewish communities developed in three main areas of the English-speaking Caribbean: Barbados, Nevis and Jamaica. The communities mostly comprised Sephardi Jews who originally hailed from... more
During the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Jewish communities developed in three main areas of the English-speaking Caribbean: Barbados, Nevis and Jamaica. The communities mostly comprised Sephardi Jews who originally hailed from Portugal and later from Brazil, Amsterdam, London, and the other islands. Small numbers of Ashkenazi Jews were present but only became sizeable congregations in the nineteenth century.
Jewish individuals arrived in Barbados as early as 1628, and by the 1670s had formed into a sizeable community. Jewish life on Nevis followed a similar pattern, but a more prominent Jewish presence on Nevis arose after an exodus of Jews from Barbados in the early 1700s. Jamaican Jews represented the longest lasting and most successful community in the English-speaking Caribbean. Their numbers began to increase substantially in the late 1600s with the population reaching over 2,500 by the end of the 1800s. The Sephardi Jews in this region were not a distinct and separate entity; they were deeply connected through trade and intermarriage to other Sephardi Jewish communities across the Caribbean, Europe, and the North American colonies. These networks, combined with their multilingualism, led the British colonial powers to regard Jewish immigrants as an asset.
Overall, Jews on the British-controlled islands fared better under their relatively more tolerant governments, and Jewish merchants and traders helped transform the local economies. While they practiced their religion freely and built some of the oldest synagogues in the New World, Jews were still regarded as socially and culturally inferior to their fellow British colonists. These negative attitudes occasionally escalated into acts of discrimination and violence. In Jamaica, anti-Jewish prejudice was expressed through punitive and discriminatory taxes, and in Speightstown, Barbados, rising resentment towards successful Jewish merchant enterprises culminated in a mob attack. Despite their notable contributions to the growth and success of the English-speaking islands of the Caribbean, Jews did not gain full legal and civil rights until the 1800s.
Jewish individuals arrived in Barbados as early as 1628, and by the 1670s had formed into a sizeable community. Jewish life on Nevis followed a similar pattern, but a more prominent Jewish presence on Nevis arose after an exodus of Jews from Barbados in the early 1700s. Jamaican Jews represented the longest lasting and most successful community in the English-speaking Caribbean. Their numbers began to increase substantially in the late 1600s with the population reaching over 2,500 by the end of the 1800s. The Sephardi Jews in this region were not a distinct and separate entity; they were deeply connected through trade and intermarriage to other Sephardi Jewish communities across the Caribbean, Europe, and the North American colonies. These networks, combined with their multilingualism, led the British colonial powers to regard Jewish immigrants as an asset.
Overall, Jews on the British-controlled islands fared better under their relatively more tolerant governments, and Jewish merchants and traders helped transform the local economies. While they practiced their religion freely and built some of the oldest synagogues in the New World, Jews were still regarded as socially and culturally inferior to their fellow British colonists. These negative attitudes occasionally escalated into acts of discrimination and violence. In Jamaica, anti-Jewish prejudice was expressed through punitive and discriminatory taxes, and in Speightstown, Barbados, rising resentment towards successful Jewish merchant enterprises culminated in a mob attack. Despite their notable contributions to the growth and success of the English-speaking islands of the Caribbean, Jews did not gain full legal and civil rights until the 1800s.
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Article for SOURCE as part of the "Library Spaces" series edited by Brian W. Keith
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One such project, part of the George A. Smathers Libraries' Celebrating Cuba! initiative, has enabled the digitization of rare publications from the historic synagogue library in Havana, Cuba. The synagogue library (la Biblioteca)
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Brochure celebrating a special rebinding project at the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica. Content by Rebecca J. W. Jefferson and design by Barbara Hood.
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Short article about the history of the Isser and Rae Price Library of Judaica for HaTanin: the Newsletter of the Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Florida
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Exhibition catalogue with select pieces from the 40th anniversary exhibition of the Isser and Rae Price Library, March 2021. Content by Rebecca J. W. Jefferson and design by Lourdes Sanatamaría-Wheeler.
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An analysis of the various Bodleian genizah sub-collections and comparison to each other in terms of size, content, state of preservation and provenance. This analysis will reveal similarities in size, content and state among manuscripts... more
An analysis of the various Bodleian genizah sub-collections and comparison to each other in terms of size, content, state of preservation and provenance. This analysis will reveal similarities in size, content and state among manuscripts from within the same period of collecting, and it will suggest that a study of this nature may help reconstruct a more precise provenance and provenience history for the c.300,000 manuscript fragments now collectively known as “the Cairo Genizah”.
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A PPT presented at the "scholarly webinar on Idan Dershowitz' recent assessment of the Shapira documents"
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This is the draft of an essay being prepared for publication. A fifteen-minute version was presented at the "scholarly webinar on Idan Dershowitz' recent assessment of the Shapira documents," June 10, 2021.
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An annotated edition of the letters and documents from or concerning the protagonists who discovered the Cairo Genizah fragments
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Researching and writing the life story of Count Riamo d'Hulst
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New book project: a study of Elkan Nathan Adler, his collecting and the private library he built in London prior to its sale in 1923