[INDOLOGY] Nirnaya Sagar Press and hebrew

[Harry Spier]

Dear Matthew,

Your link leads to "Hebrew, Judeo-Arabic, and Marathi Jewish Printing in
India Online",
https://primarysources.brillonline.com/browse/hebrew-printing-in-india
the background tab of which leads to "Printing in India, and the
Introduction of Hebrew Type" . I had no idea of the volume!

Searching on "Nirnaya Sagar"
https://primarysources.brillonline.com/search?search-go=&q=nirnaya+sagar&sort=true&fq=collection%3A%22hebrew-printing-in-india%22

shows 6 hebrew and judaic related books published at Nirnaya Sagar press
between 1887 and 1906.

Fascinating and thank you.

Harry Spier


On Mon, May 12, 2025 at 6:13 PM Matthew Kapstein <mattkapstein at proton.me>
wrote:

> Dear Harry,
>
> The Valmadonna Collection is where I would look for this. Here are some
> basic search results,
>
>
> https://www.google.com/search?q=valmadonna+collection+india&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-fr&client=safari
>
> But you’ll have to dig deeper to gain access. In any case, it’s certainly
> one of the besr, perhaps the best collection, of Hebrew printing from
> India.
>
> good luck, בהצלחה
> Matthew
>
>
> On Mon, May 12, 2025 at 14:58, Harry Spier via INDOLOGY <
> indology at list.indology.info
> <On+Mon,+May+12,+2025+at+14:58,+Harry+Spier+via+INDOLOGY+%3C%3Ca+href=>>
> wrote:
>
> Dear list members,
>
> First thank you to Madhav,Deshpande, Birgit Kellner, Phillip Maas and
> Andrew Ollett for the indian printer and devanagari references.  Madhav has
> confirmed off-list that देवनागरी मुद्राक्षरलेखनकला is a Marathi version by
> Naik of his "Typography of Devanagari".
>
> In the reference Madhav gave for the history of Nirnaya Sagar Press
>
> https://archive.org/details/NirnayaSagarACenturyOfTypeCastingPrintingAndPublishingVinayakYKulkarni
>
> it says about the founder Jawaji Dadaji that he cast 7 varieties of types
> for Vedic Sanskrit, 20 of Devanagari, 15 of Gurajarati, * two of Hebrew *and
> one of Kannada. It also includes this printed page of hebrew  (presumably
> from Nirnaya Sagar Press) copied below.  From the little hebrew I remember
> from over half a century ago, it appears to some kind of sample page with
> each line repeated. With the first occurance without vowel markers (the
> usual way of writing hebrew) immediately followed by the same line with
> vowel markers (how you write hebrew for beginners).  The larger type is a
> line from one of the psalms followed by Genesis 1:3  with I think a
> spelling error.
>
> Does anyone know the story of this hebrew type cast by Nirnaya Sagar
> Press? Did Nirnaya Sagar Press print a book or books for a Jewish community
> in India?
>
> [image: image.png]
> Thanks,
> Harry Spier
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://list.indology.info/pipermail/indology/attachments/20250512/3185e245/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image.png
Type: image/png
Size: 5703578 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://list.indology.info/pipermail/indology/attachments/20250512/3185e245/attachment.png>