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References
As an introduction to this genre of Yiddish literature there should be mentioned S. Zfatman, Yiddish Narrative Prose from its Beginnings to Shivche ha-Besht (1504–1894) (Ph.D. thesis, Hebrew University of Jerusalem 1983). An edition of the first imprint in English was translated and introduced by M. Gaster, Ma’asseh Books, 2 vols (Philadelphia 1934). A study of the Basle 1602 edition was executed by J. Meitlis, Das Ma’assebuch. Seine Entstehung und Quellengeschichte (Hildesheim etc. 1987) (=reprint of Berlin 1933). There are also different handwritten sources. They refer to the origin of the genre in the Ashkenazic communities in Italy. Several studies on the manuscript tradition were undertaken, for example by S. Zfatman, ‘Maase bukh. Kavim li-demuto shel janer be-sifrut yidish ha-yeshanah. Im gilluyo shel maase bukh: ketav-yad Yerushalayim Heb 8; 5245’, Ha-sifrut 28 (1979) 126–152, and E. Timm, ‘Zur Frühgeschichte der jiddischen Erzählprosa. Eine neuaufgefundene Maise-Handschrift’, Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur 117 (1995) 243–280.
Cf. Meitlis, Das Ma’assebuch, 16. Meitlis names this cycle ‘Rhein-und Donau-Sagen’. They contain thirty stories on the chassidim.
For this formula and its talmudic origin, cf. Timm, ‘Zur Frühgeschichte’, esp. 246f.
In the text the narrator uses the term hrtyxhv (histori). vagn appears on the title page and at the beginning of the story (fols 2v; 3r). The difference in terminology is already known in the early-modern Yiddish mayses. History is used for mayses of non-Jewish origin that came up in the late sixteenth century, cf. Timm, ‘Zur Frühgeschichte’, 250. Here both meanings fused into one.
Hs. Ros. 658, cf. E.G.L. Schrijver, Towards a Supplementary Catalogue of Hebrew Manusscripts in the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana. Theory and Practice (Amsterdam 1993) 87f., n. 12, and idem, ‘An Inventory of Undescribed Hebrew Manuscripts in the Bibliotheca Rosenthaliana’, Studia Rosenthaliana 20 (1986) 171, n. 29. The manuscript was donated to the library by Leo Fuks, who discovered it in Amsterdam after World War II. There is an introductory article by Fuks, ‘Ein sjijn naj majse foen a chosid’, Maandblad voor de geschiedenis der Joden in Nederland I (1948) vol. 4, 103–108, and idem, ‘Ayn sheyn nay mayse fun eyn khosid, a yidisher ksav-yad fun 1746’, Yivo-bleter 29 (1947) 287–291.
There are various studies on Bible-translation into taytsh, a special translation terminology near to Yiddish. I would like to mention the thesis of M. Aptroot, Bible Translation as Cultural Reform. The Amsterdam Yiddish Bibles (1678–1679) (Oxford 1989), and Ch. Turniansky, ‘Le-toldot ha-taytsh-khumesh, khumesh mit khiber’, in ‘Iyyunim be-sifrut. Devarim she-ne’emru be’erev likhvod Dov Sadan bi-mlot lo shemonim ve-chamesh shanah (Jerusalem 1988) 21–58.
Cf. M. Aptroot, ‘Northwestern Yiddish: the State of Research’, in D.B. Kerler, ed., History of Yiddish Studies. Winter Studies in Yiddish Language and Literature (13–15.12. 1987) (Chur 1991) 41–59, esp. 48. I would like to thank Marion Aptroot for informing me about the use of h in parodies of the Dutch-Yiddish dialect.
On the broadsheet of ‘De geleerde in syn kamer’, cf. A. van der Heide, ‘De Geleerde in sijn kamer./ The Scholar in his study’, Studia Rosenthaliana 14 (1980) 228–238.
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Butzer, E. (2004). An Entertaining mayse from Amsterdam 1746. In: Berger, S., Brocke, M., Zwiep, I. (eds) Zutot 2003. Zutot: Perspectives on Jewish Culture, vol 3. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-2628-5_19
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