Talk:Arbatel de magia veterum

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I have written privately to Sadena, who seems to have done a lot of quite direct and extensive research, among other things taking the trouble to look at the printers business records, stored at the university of Basel. This research has not been more publically aired and I gather that Sadena currently has other focal interests now, though he was generous enough in answering my own questions. I am unsure as to how to proceed in interpolating what I have learned by private correspondence (which does, finally, point to testable assertions of contact with primary sources) for public consumption. Please advise.

...I tried writing to Sadena via the e-mail on his website, but I got a failure message. I wanted to discuss the fact that, in his translation, he identifies two errors in the Hebrew and corrects them. Here's what I tried to send:

Hi Sadena,

Saw with interest your translation... hope you don't mind some very minor critical feedback about the Hebrew on the frontispiece.

I'm fairly sure the Hebrew isn't wrong - it's just different to modern standard hebrew. The beth (or "beis", as we say) does indeed look like a kaph with a kink, but that's how beth was written in the semi-cursive Rashi script (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hebrew_alphabet for a comparitive table - there it is, with the kink). Think it's deliberate and odd rather than careless and wrong.

As for the second complaint, I think there's a reason for that too. In modern hebrew, "Tav" is always pronounced as a T; in Ashkenazi, it's sometimes pronounced as an S (e.g., a lot of European jews say "shabbas" instead of shabbat). So Ashkenazis have always put a dot inside the Tav to indicate when it should be a T. I think that what you're looking is just a Tav with a dot inside it (again, possibly in a slightly odd typeface) to stop Ashkenazis seeing "arbasel" instead of "arbatel".

So I don't think it's down to a baffled printer getting his characters muddled, but rather because the Hebrew was composed by an Ashkenazi jew using a slightly unfamiliar, Rashi-influenced typeset.

What do you think?

Cheers [...]

Couldn't reach him tho'.John fagin 12:35, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Actually, heck - the article mentions the correction of errors, so I'll add it in there, citing the Wikipedia article.John fagin 12:38, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry you were unable to contact me, but I was incarcerated in 2007 and 2008. As for my research, you are welcome to it, though the binder is stored in my library, which is in boxes, and quite a lot of it is on microfiche. If anyone is seriously interested in it (films of the original printings, copies of the printing ledgers of Peter Perna, etc), please contact me at sadena@sadena.com. I am currently moving to Seattle, so it may be a few months before my library is unboxed and put in order. You can view some of the scans of the films at http://www.arbatel.org/Scans/ As to direct questions about my research, without the material in my hand I am unable to comment, as it really has been a long time, and a lot has happened in the meantime. Plus my feet are currently both broken, and I'm heavily medicated (mmmmmm) Sadena (talk) 12:27, 27 April 2009 (UTC)