Jewish Literary Experimentation in Medieval Sicily

• In Event: Jewish Italian Literary Continuities and Contiguities

Abstract

The complex compositional landscape of medieval Sicily was home to Jewish authors whom scholars have traditionally considered as extensions of their Jewish-Andalusi predecessors. But this time and place—which encompassed the proliferation of Arabic court poetry under the rule of Roger II, the robust translation program of Frederick II, and the blossoming poetry of the scuola siciliana—seems to have encouraged more experimentation than has previously been acknowledged.

To trace particular strands of overlapping and influence across literary and language traditions in medieval Italy, Sicily, and more broadly the Mediterranean, I focus on poetry by Anatoli ben Joseph, who was born in Provence, exchanged letters with Maimonides while living in Egypt, and wrote secular Hebrew poetry while living in Sicily in the first half of the thirteenth century. In keeping with Maimonides’s negative opinion of secular erotic lyrics, Anatoli ben Joseph seems to have avoided composing love poetry (as far as his extant works reveal), but he was nonetheless a prolific poet.

While scholars have tended to regard Anatoli’s poetry as solely derivative of Hispano-Hebraic lyrics and not at all innovative, it seems, on close examination, that his metapoetic gaze is conspicuous and not entirely derived from Andalusi predecessors. After contextualizing and commenting on some of his poetry, I compare his poetic approach to that of contemporary poets of the scuola siciliana (Sicilian School), including Pier della Vigne (ca. 1182-1249). I also consider the overlapping of Anatoli ben Joseph’s poetry with the composition of the first Hebrew maqamas in twelfth-century northern Spain and offer kindred instances of literary motifs found in his poetry and in Solomon ibn Ṣaqbel’s NE'UM ASHER BEN YEHUDA, the earliest extant Hebrew maqama.

By highlighting aspects of these multicultural and multilingual environs, I aim to offer insights into this time of intricate overlapping and shared cultural models, while keeping in mind that it is often not possible to trace the passage of ideas in linear ways.

Author

• Isabelle Levy, Columbia University