The scribe and illustrator Joseph ben David came from Leipnik, in northeastern Moravia (now the Czech Republic) and lived in Frankfurt am Main, Darmstadt, Altona, and Hamburg. In the eighteenth century, Hebrew manuscript illustration experienced a revival in Germany and Central Europe. While he was neither the most prolific nor the most skilled artist of his time, Leipnik became a famous and influential scribe and illuminator, introducing new themes and using color in innovative ways. Fifteen of his manuscripts (one illustrated by another artist) have survived, dated between 1730 and 1740, among them fourteen Haggadahs. Some information about his life, including his patrons, can be gleaned from the colophons he added to his manuscripts. He probably supplemented his income by teaching children of rich families.
This page from a Haggadah produced in Amsterdam is an example of the work of Joseph Ben David Leipnik, a prominent eighteenth-century scribe and artist known particularly for his illustrated Haggadahs…
When you enter the land that the Lord your God is giving you as a heritage, and you possess it and settle in it, you shall take some of every first fruit of the soil, which you harvest from the land…
This rare example of a Roman ketubah (marriage contract) from the seventeenth century was written on the occasion of the marriage of Menahem ben Samuel Zadik to Zevia, daughter of the prominent banker…