Azariah de' Rossi (M / Italy, 1513-1578), scholar
Revision as of 01:46, 27 May 2010 by Gabriele Boccaccini (talk | contribs)
Azariah de' Rossi (c1513-1578) was a Jewish Italian scholar.
Biography
Azariah de' Rossi was born in Mantua [Italy], the descendant of an old Jewish family which claimed to have been brought by Titus from Jerusalem. 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 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.