I have written before about Rabbi Shlomo Duran, the ‘Rashbash’, and his book, Sefer haRashbash, which was printed in Livorno in 1742 by Abraham Meldola. Livorno, on the west coast of Tuscany, is traditionally known as Leghorn in English.
This book of novellae on three tractates of Talmud, Niddah, Rosh Hashana and Kinnim is by Rabbi Shlomo Duran’s father, Rabbi Shimon ben Tzemach Duran, and was printed by Abraham Meldola two years later, in 1744.
Abraham Meldola was the uncle of Haham Raphael Meldola, the Rabbi of the Sephardic community in London, whose Synagogue was, and still is, known as Bevis Marks.
Rabbi Shimon ben Tzemah Duran, was born in the Hebrew month of Adar, 1361. Various accounts put his birthplace as either Barcelona, or the island of Mallorca. After the 1391 massacre in the Balearic Islands, he fled Spain with his father and sister for Algiers, where, in addition to practicing medicine, he continued his studies during the earlier part of his stay. In 1394 he and the Algerian rabbi Isaac ben Sheshet (“the Rivash”) drafted statutes for the Jewish community of Algiers. After the Rivash’s retirement, Duran became rabbi of Algiers in 1407 or 1408.
He was a prominent Jewish scholar, rabbinic authority, and polemicist. He was proficient in various fields, including philosophy, mathematics, natural sciences, astronomy, and medicine.
While his major halachic responsa (answers to Jewish legal questions) are compiled in his book Tashbatz, his Chidushim (novellae), in this book, focus on specific tractates of the Talmud, offering sharp textual breakdowns, conceptual analysis, and halachic conclusions. The section on Niddah explains and elucidates on ritual purity laws, blood stains (ketamim) and menstrual status.
The book starts with approbations (haskomos) from two relatives of the printer, Raphael Meldola (cousin of the London Raphael Meldola) and Moshe Meldola.
Jewish Miscellanies 