Img. ID: 332838

The first sheet of the scroll includes a prefatory panel with benedictions and a liturgical poem and one column of the text (no. 1).

Opening decoration: The illustration closes the column containing the final section of the Asher Heni poem that is followed by Shoshanat Yaakov poem and is placed just below the text. In the frame probably two episodes are joined - the feast of King Ahasuerus and the feast of Queen Vashti; the king and the queen with crowns on their heads and in sophisticated attire are shown on the right. Eight guests sit at the long table above which a chandelier is hanging. In the upper-left corner, a group of musicians playing various instruments is placed. They stand on a balcony and just below it a Hebrew inscription is placed: והשקות בכלי זהב וכלים מכלים שונים - "And they gave them drink in vessels of gold, (the vessels being diverse one from another)" (Es. 1:7).

Text column no. 1: The text begins with the decorative initial word formed of enlarged ribbon letters. In the lower-left corner of the column, the moment of death of Queen Vashti is depicted. The queen is kneeling between two women who strangulate her with a scarf. The scene is related to the extra-biblical tales saying that Vashti was killed after she refused to appear in front of the king during the feast. Most likely, the engraver was inspired by a similar illustration incorporated in the Amsterdam printed scrolls of the early 18th century that in the Index are called "the scrolls with portrait medallions" and "the scrolls with landscapes"; however, the direct source for this representation remains unknown.