The Patient, the Impostor and the Seducer
Medieval European Literature in Hebrew

Tovi Bibring

Transcript 11

Legenda

  Summer 2025

ISBN: 978-1-781888-35-3 (hardback)  •  RRP £95, $120, €120

ISBN: 978-1-781888-36-0 (paperback, forthcoming)

ISBN: 978-1-781888-37-7 (JSTOR ebook)

MedievalFrenchItalianSpanishPoetrySatire


A sick man who was bled by his physician and diagnosed as pregnant, an obscene impostor bearded from head to toe, who was assassinated for his love for a black servant, and a crafty seducer who enticed the love of a nun and then caused her to commit suicide – these and other fantastical and allegorical stories found in medieval Hebrew writings are discussed in this comparative study, highlighting simultaneously their indebtedness to older European sources and their originality. Tovi Bibring, a specialist of medieval literature, examines select tales from three eminent works: Berechiah ben rabbi Natronai ha-Naqdan's compilation of about one hundred Aesopian fables, entitled Mishle Shu'alim ('Fox Fables', Normandy, twelfth century), Ya'akov ben Elazar's collection of ten short stories, known as Sefer ha-Meshalim ('The book of tales', Toledo, thirteenth century), and Immanuel ha-Romi's 28 Mahbarot Imanuel ('Immanuel's scrolls' or 'texts', Rome (fourteenth century).

Tovi Bibring is Senior Lecturer in French Culture at Bar-Ilan University, Israel.

Bibliography entry:

Bibring, Tovi, The Patient, the Impostor and the Seducer: Medieval European Literature in Hebrew, Transcript, 11 (Legenda, 2025)

First footnote reference: 35 Tovi Bibring, The Patient, the Impostor and the Seducer: Medieval European Literature in Hebrew, Transcript, 11 (Legenda, 2025), p. 21.

Subsequent footnote reference: 37 Bibring, p. 47.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)

Bibliography entry:

Bibring, Tovi. 2025. The Patient, the Impostor and the Seducer: Medieval European Literature in Hebrew, Transcript, 11 (Legenda)

Example citation: ‘A quotation occurring on page 21 of this work’ (Bibring 2025: 21).

Example footnote reference: 35 Bibring 2025: 21.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)


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