Wednesday, January 21, 2009

1843 English translation of 18 Treatises from the Mishna; also, orangutans

It's definitely worth checking out Eighteen Treatises from the Mishna, an English translation of 18 massekhtos from 1843. See the circumstances surrounding its production in the Preface below (and check out that footnote!*).

Text not available

This is the not the first English translation of a part of the Mishnah. I believe that honor is due to William Wotton, whom I blogged about here.

* But see here about a question of delicate sensibility in translation, where an English machzor from 1796 translated mei raglayim, and a siddur from 1949 didn't. Of course, the translator of the machzor was an Ashkenazi; the translators of the Mishna were Western Sefardim!

See also the following footnote (pg. 30) on אדני שדה:
stronger than those foaled by she asses 4 The description of this animal given by various commentators of the Mishna is that of an absolutely fabulous one which cannot have been meant by the text According to Dr Jost

Apparently Tiferes Yisrael was preceded by Jost.

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