Obj. ID: 35321
Jewish printed books  Selichot, Amsterdam, 1688

The following description was prepared by William Gross:

This book contains a selection of Selichot prayers. While the content is not unusual, the first page contains one of the more beautiful titlepages in in the history of Hebrew printing. These woodcut illustrations were apparently made to the order of this publisher, Moses Kosman. Kosman only published two books, the other being Meliz Yosher (additions and supplements to the Ze'ena u-Re'ena). That book uses a larger version of this same titlepage, with two additional scenes.
The book is printed in Ivri-Teitsch, for women, as is the other book from this press. Since the woodcuts present scenes from the biblical stories in the Meliz Yosher, and lacks two woodcuts, it would appear that Kosman's Selichot was the second of the two books to be printed.
Moses Kosman was a businessman in Amsterdam with several enterprises. He established a Hebrew press in 1688, the year this book with issued, but soon determined that he had insufficient time for publishing, and that the international printing business was more complex and less rewarding than he had anticipated. He sold the business to Moses b. Avraham Avinu in 1689 after printing only two books. The volume is also one of those two. Both used essentially the same woodcuts for the decoration of their title pages.
Original leather binding, lacking clasps.