CASTELLAZZO, MOSES DA (1467–1527), Italian painter and engraver. A son of Abraham Sachs, a German immigrant, he lived at Venice, Mestre, and Ferrara. He was brother-in-law of Jacob *Landau, author of Agur. Castellazzo boasted in a petition to the Venetian Council of Ten that he had been occupied "for many years past in this happy city in making portraits of gentlemen and other famous men, so that their memory should remain for all time, and similarly in other parts of Italy." In 1521 he received both from the Council and from the Marquess of Mantua a copyright for a series of illustrations to the Pentateuch, which were to be engraved in wood by his sons.

Castellazzo was also a medallist and worked in metal. His patrons included the future Cardinal Bembo. None of his work can now be traced. When the adventurer David *Reubeni arrived in Venice in 1523, Castellazzo supported him and helped him to go to Rome.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

L.A. Mayer, Bibliography of Jewish Art (1967), index; C. Roth, Jews in the Renaissance (1959), 192, 354.

Sources: Encyclopaedia Judaica. © 2007 The Gale Group. All Rights Reserved.

Moses da Castellazzo