Sunday 13 September 2015

IZAK GERMAYZE

IZAK GERMAYZE
           He was the author of a pamphlet: Rus, daytsh, lateynishes elementar-bukh (Elementary book for Russian, German, and Latin) (Vilna, 1846), 43 pp.[1]  There was a well-known, highly diversified family named Germayze in Vilna.  For example, Yehude-Leyb was a Hebrew poet and author of dictionaries and Toledot rusya (History of Russia) of 1836 and Meir nativ (The path-lighter) of 1836, a lexicon of Hebrew poetry.  He also adapted for the Yiddish Robinzon kruze (Robinson Crusoe).  He was the owner of a private school for Jewish girls.  A second well-known Germayze in Vilna was Zaynvl, a military supplier in 1812, who played an important role in the Lithuanian Enlightenment.  Possibly this “Izak” is identical with one of these two men, or he may have been a relative.

Source: Dr. Y. Shatski, Kultur-geshikhte fun der haskole in lite (Cultural history of the Enlightenment in Lithuania) (Buenos Aires, 1950), pp. 87-113.



[1] Translator’s note.  Worldcat gives as an alternate Russian title for this work: Novyi rossiisko-nemet︠s︡ko-latinskii bukvarʹ s evreiskim tolkovaniem (New Russian-German-Latin primer with Yiddish explanation).

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