the beginning of this
period by Tobiah Cohen, who was born at Metz in 1652, and died in
Jerusalem in 1729. It is a medley of science and fiction, an
encyclopedia dealing with all branches of knowledge. He had studied at
the Universities of Frankfort and Padua, had enjoyed the patronage of
the Elector of Brandenburg, and his medical knowledge won him many
distinguished patients in Constantinople. Thus his work contains many
medical chapters of real value, and he gives one of the earliest
accounts of recently discovered drugs and medicinal plants. Among other
curiosities he maintained that he had discovered the Pygmies.

From this absorbing but confusing book our survey must turn finally to
N.H. Wessely, who in 1782 for the first time maintained the importance
of the study of geography in Jewish school education. The works of the
past, with their consoling legends and hopes, continued to hold a place
in the heart of Jewish readers. But from Wessely's time onwards a long
series of Jewish explorers and travellers have joined the ranks of those
who have opened up for modern times a real knowledge of the globe.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Steinschneider.--_Jewish Literature_, p. 80.

A. Neubauer.--Series of Articles entitled _Where are the Ten Tribes_,
_J.Q.R._, Vol. I.

BENJAMIN OF TUDELA.

A. Asher.--_The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela_ (with English
translation and appendix by Zunz. London, 1840-1).

PETACHIAH OF RATISBON.

A. Benisch.--_Travels of Petachia of Ratisbon_ (with English
translation. London, 1856).

ABRAHAM FARISSOL.

Graetz.--IV, p. 413 [440].

DAVID REUBENI.

Graetz.--IV, p. 491 [523].

H. WESSELY.

Graetz.--V, p. 366 [388].

CHAPTER XXI

HISTORIANS AND CHRONICLERS

Order of the Tannaim and Amoraim.--Achimaaz.--Abraham Ibn
Daud.--Josippon.--Historical Elegies, or Selichoth.--Memorial
Books.--Abraham Zacuto.--Elijah Kapsali.--Usque.--Ibn
Verga.--Joseph Cohen.--David Gans.--Gedaliah Ibn
Yachya.--Azariah di Rossi.

The historical books to be found in the Bible, the Apocrypha, and the
Hellenistic literature prove that the Hebrew genius was not unfitted for
the presentation of the facts of Jewish life. These older works, as well
as the writings of Josephus, also show a faculty for placing local
records in relation to the wider facts of general history. After the
dispersion of the Jews, however, the local was the only history in which
the Jews could bear a pa