Azariah de' Rossi (M / Italy, 1513-1578), scholar
Azariah de' Rossi (c1513-1578) was a Jewish Italian scholar.
Biography
Born in Mantua. Proficient in Hebrew, Greek, Latin and Italian, studied medicine, archaeology, history, Greek and Roman antiquities and Christian ecclesiastical history.
Works on Second Temple Judaism
Azariah de' Rossi descended from an old Jewish Family which claimed to have been brought by Titus from Jerusalem. He was the first modern Jewish scholar to focus on Second Temple Judaism, its history, archaeology and literature (especially Aristeas, Philo and Josephus), and use secular sources to supplement or check the data in Talmudic literature.