Yishaq Ben Shelomoh Ibn Sahulah

Mashal ha-kadmoni [The Ancient Tale]

Palatine Library, St. De Rossi 990/6

"The work, composed in 1298 by the Castilian Ibn Sahulah, poet and Kabbalist scholar, to offer Jewish readers a Jewish equivalent of the Arab "Travels of Sindbad the sailor" or of the "Kalilah and Dimnah" of Indian origin, is a product of the Adriatic activity of Gershom ben Mosheh Soncino, accompanied by 78 splendid woodcuts which make it the first illustrated Jewish book, ever to appear in print. The images seem to have all come from the hand of the same artist, who maintains himself strictly within the tradition of the courtly illustration and bestiaries.In the cartoons, princes and princesses, jesters and banquet and hunting scenes alternate talking and crowned animals, symbols of human virtues and vices.