To all to whom these presents shall come

£500 · Offered by Shapero Rare Books

power of attorney A power of attorney relating to the will of Jacob Israel Bernal, a merchant and patriarch of the Sephardi family who settled in London in the first half of the eighteenth century. The document, dated 13th September 1768, authorises Israel Bernal the Younger to recover costs owing to the executors of the will, Isaac Roiz do Valle, and Jacob Israel Bernal. 'When in 1744 Jacob Israel Bernal, a descendant of a family of Inquisitional martyrs and Gabbai of the K. K. Sahar Asamaim, applied to the Mahamad for leave to marry Johebed Baruch, a tudesca, he was compelled to resign, and the most humiliating conditions were imposed before the ceremony was authorised, and then only in a truncated form. (It was because of this episode that the Bernal family, who afterwards furnished English politics and society with some beloved figures, began to become estranged from Judaism)' (Roth). Manuscript power of attorney; folio (33.5 x 20.5 cm); blindstamp to recto header, signatures and seals to verso; in four pieces with three minor areas of text loss along former fold lines; [2] pp. Cf.Roth (History of the Great Synagogue) ch.4.

• Binding: Hardcover

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