Astronomical Illustration

Solomon ben Abraham Avigdor

Artist Unknown

16th Century

Manuscript page with concentric circles, zodiacal signs and Hebrew labels in outer circles, and some Hebrew text above and below.

This diagram of the cosmos is from a treatise on astronomy, Sefer mareh ha-ofanim (The Appearance of the Heavenly Beings), by Solomon ben Abraham Avigdor. The treatise was mostly a translation of Johannes de Sacrobosco’s thirteenth-century Latin text De sphaera mundi (On the Sphere of the World), considered the standard textbook on astronomy until the mid-seventeenth century. This manuscript was written in Mantua, Italy.

Credits

The British Library, London, England. Or. 10661. From the collection of The British Library, The Polonsky Foundation Catalogue of Digitised Hebrew Manuscripts.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 5.

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Creator Bio

Solomon ben Abraham Avigdor

14th Century–15th Century

Born in Provence, Solomon ben Abraham Avigdor was a translator and physician. By the time he reached his teen years, he was already translating scientific works from Latin into Hebrew, including a translation of Arnauld de Villeneuve's work, De Judiciis Astronomiæ (On the Judgement of the Stars) at the age of 15. His translations were popular with later Hebrew scholars, who relied on them for Latin knowledge.

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