Beschreibung:

HEBREW MANUSCRIPT. Esther Scroll. Engraved Megillat Esther from Italy, 18th century. Printed and hand-colored on vellum, 4 membranes, 157 mm. high. 12 columns, (80 x 111 mm.) of 20 lines. Opening section damaged, some tears repaired by parchment patches, text worn throughout. Third membrane, contemporary with the rest of the scroll, is hand-drawn, in imitation of the engraved border. Scroll contained in brown leather tube with gold-colored embellishment. The megillah's popular engraved border shows in its upper and lower margins twenty-four polylobed frames joined by decorative knot elements. Vignettes from the Purim narrative, beginning with the feasts of Ahasuerus and Vashti and ending with the Jews rejoicing, fill these frames. A repeated floral pattern separates the text panels. Reference: Metzger, Mendel. "The Earliest Engraved Italian Megillot," Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, Manchester , 48, 1966, cf. plate I a.-- Purim: The Face and the Mask , Yeshiva University Museum, 1979, cf. colorplate facing p. 21.