Mocatta Manuscripts
Item
-
Country
-
GB
-
Language of name of institution
-
eng
-
Contact information: postal address
-
Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT
-
Contact information: phone number
-
0044 (0) 20 7679 7792
-
Contact information: email
-
spec.coll@ucl.ac.uk
-
Reference number
-
MS MOCATTA
-
Type of reference number
-
Archival reference number
-
Title (official language of the state)
-
Mocatta Manuscripts
-
Language of title
-
eng
-
Creator / accumulator
-
Frederic David Mocatta
-
Date note
-
14th century/20th century
-
Language(s)
-
eng
-
heb
-
Extent
-
76 storage units
-
Type of material
-
Textual Material
-
Scope and content
-
The Mocatta Manuscripts collection comprises a mixture of religious and non-religious material, including service books, fragments of the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, prayer books, letters, diaries, calendars, and drawings. One of its highlights is a Manuscript Haggadah, produced in the first half of the 14th century, presumably in Castile (MS MOCATTA/1). It is made of parchment and richly decorated in ink, gouache, and silver and gold leaf. This item is notable for the use of micrographic text, the minute decorative text found throughout the manuscript. The micrography, and indeed the entire manuscript, may have been the work of a scribe known as Jacob, who was active in Barcelona in the second quarter of the 14th century. See the description in Mann and Glick (1992) and Avrin (1991). The collection also includes liturgical and religious manuscripts from the Sephardic community of London, such as a collection of Sermons, lectures, and a responsum by David Aaron de Sola (1796-1860) (MS MOCATTA/65) and an Order of service for circumcision according to the custom in the Jewish congregation of London, dating 1782 or 1783 (MS MOCATTA/72).
-
Archival history
-
The Mocatta Library was jointly founded by University College of London and the Jewish Historical Society of England in 1906, after the philanthropist and bibliophile Frederic David Mocatta (1828–1905) left his vast library to the Society. Mocatta's collection was enriched by other donations and purchases in the early 20th century, becoming one of the finest and most comprehensive Jewish Studies libraries in the United Kingdom. Tragically, the library was destroyed by bombing in 1940; only the rarest books, pamphlets and manuscripts survived, having been moved to Wales for safekeeping.
However, the library was quickly re-constituted through donations from many individuals and organisations, including the Jewish collections of the Guildhall Library, and the extensive libraries of the journalist Asher Myers (1848-1902) and the American scholar Cyrus Adler (1863-1940). It continued to be enlarged after the war. The Mocatta Library was merged with the University College of London's other Jewish collections in 1990.
-
(source: UCL Digital Collections: Jewish Pamphlets Collection)
-
Administrative / Biographical history
-
Frederic David Mocatta (1828-1905) was a British philanthropist, historian, bibliophile, and patron of learning. From 1857 to 1874, he directed the firm (founded by his grandfather) of Mocatta and Goldsmid, bullion brokers to the Bank of England. Upon retirement, he devoted his time to charitable works.
Mocatta’s chief historical work is The Jews of Spain and Portugal and the Inquisition (1877), which was later translated into several languages. He is perhaps best remembered as a patron of learning and as a bibliophile. He subsidised the publication of such major works as Leopold Zunz's Zur Geschichte und Literatur (1845) and the classic History of the Jews (1891–92), a condensed and updated translation of Heinrich Graetz’s Geschichte der Juden von den ältesten Zeiten bis auf die Gegenwart, 11 vol. (1853–76). Mocatta bequeathed his library of Jewish history and English Judaica to the University College of London.
-
(source: "Frederic David Mocatta" in Encyclopaedia Britannica)
-
Author of the description
-
Carla Vieira, 2023
