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Delmar

DELMAR (De Le Mar; Lebhar, from Arabic al-Bahr, "the sea"), Moroccan family of merchants and diplomats. The first known member of the family was JACOB LEBHAR of Safi (c. 1650). SHALOM DELMAR-LEBHAR (d. after 1775), "merchant of the sultan" of Morocco in Mogador, was known as a scholar and kabbalist. Of his five sons, MORDECAI was adviser to the sultan and in 1780 was put in charge of all commerce and the port of the city. Together with his brother JOSEPH of Mogador, he was an agent for the ransoming of Christian captives. MASʿŪD was appointed agent for the sultan in Amsterdam, where he negotiated the peace treaties of 1777. Later he went to London where he was received by George III; his negotiations resulted in the Anglo-Moroccan agreement of May 1783. His son ABRAHAM (c. 1826) was one of the directors of the talmud torah of Amsterdam.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

J.M. Toledano, Ner ha-Ma'arav (1911), 166–7; Hosotte-Reynaud, in: Hesperis (1957), 341; Hirschberg, Afrikah, 2 (1965), 292, 335, 367.


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