Ketubbah celebrating the marriage of David ben Abraham ben David Sabbah and Tamou bat Shalom ben Moses Abeaziz

Ketubbah celebrating the marriage of David ben Abraham ben David Sabbah and Tamou bat Shalom ben Moses Abeaziz

Public Domain

Ketubbah celebrating the marriage of David ben Abraham ben David Sabbah and Tamou bat Shalom ben Moses Abeaziz
CulturePortuguese
Titles
  • Ketubbah celebrating the marriage of David ben Abraham ben David Sabbah and Tamou bat Shalom ben Moses Abeaziz
Date1873
MediumInk, gold, pigments, and graphite with two cut-and-pasted woodcuts in metallic pigment over black ink on wove paper
DimensionsSheet: 22 11/16 × 17 3/16 in. (57.6 × 43.7 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by Mary and David S. Wolff
Object number2023.609
Not on view

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ProvenanceThe artist, 1873; David ben Abraham ben David Sabbah and Tamou bat Shalom ben Moses Abeaziz, 1873(1); José Maria Abecassis; [Sotheby’s Tel Aviv, April 27, 1989, lot 545]; Abraham Halpern (1936-2017)(2); [Sotheby’s New York, The Halpern Judaica Collection: Tradition and Treasure, Part III, Dec. 14, 2023, lot 44]; purchased by MFAH, Dec. 14, 2023.

1. According to Genealogia Hebraica: Portugal e Gibraltar sécs. XVII a XX, David Sabbah, son of Abraham Sabbah, was born prior to 1840, probably on São Miguel Island in the Azores. He married Tamou Abeaziz, who was born circa 1846 as the youngest of eleven children of Salom Abeaziz and Esther Benamu, on Faial in 1873. Soon after the wedding the couple settled in Faro on the Portuguese mainland, where they ultimately had six children. An inscription on David’s gravestone eulogizes him as a respectable, intelligent man who treated his fellow men as brothers and desired to know the Torah; Tamou’s gravestone describes her as “crown of her husband.”

2. Abraham Halpen began collecting Judaica in the 1970s, amassing holdings that encompassed silver, textiles, books, and manuscripts. He loaned to important exhibitions including Sephardic Journey, 1492-1992 and Ashkenaz: The German Jewish Heritage, both held at the Yeshiva University Museum, and had many of his purchases featured in Jay Weinstein’s seminal 1985 publication A Collector’s Guide to Judaica.


1. According to Genealogia Hebraica: Portugal e Gibraltar sécs. XVII a XX, David Sabbah, son of Abraham Sabbah, was born prior to 1840, probably on São Miguel Island in the Azores. He married Tamou Abeaziz, who was born circa 1846 as the youngest of eleven children of Salom Abeaziz and Esther Benamu, on Faial in 1873. Soon after the wedding the couple settled in Faro on the Portuguese mainland, where they ultimately had six children. An inscription on David’s gravestone eulogizes him as a respectable, intelligent man who treated his fellow men as brothers and desired to know the Torah; Tamou’s gravestone describes her as “crown of her husband.”

Exhibition HistoryAbecassis, José Maria. Genealogia Hebraica: Portugal e Gibraltar sécs. XVII a XX. Lisboa: Livr. Ferin, 1990.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Verso: inscribed in graphite, top left corner: 29
[none]
Catalogue raisonnéNone

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