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(Don) Judah Gedaliah

GEDALIAH, (Don) JUDAH (d. c. 1526), Hebrew printer. Gedaliah, who was born in Lisbon, worked there at Eliezer *Toledano's Hebrew press (1489–95) until the expulsion from Portugal (1497). He settled in Salonika, establishing the first Hebrew printing press there using fine type fonts he had brought from Lisbon. Between 1515 and 1535 he, his daughter, and his sons (who continued the firm after his death) carefully edited and printed about 30 Hebrew books including the first edition of Ein Ya'akov of R. Jacob ibn Ḥabib (1516–22). The latter, in his introduction, highly praised Gedaliah for his efforts in spreading the knowledge of Torah among the other Iberian refugees in Salonika.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

A. Freimann, in: ZHB, 11 (1907), 52–53; J. Bloch, Early Hebrew Printing in Spain and Portugal (1938), 34–54; H.D. Friedberg, Toledot ha-Defus ha-Ivri bi-Medinot Italyah… (1956), 130ff.


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