A significant part of this book was written by my late father
After the war, my father taught Ecclesiastical Law (1946â1956) and History of Italian Law (1956â1987) at Ferrara University. Between 1969 and 1971 he chaired as Faculty Dean. His favorite field of research was always the history of Italian Jewry. In this book, he investigated the Jewsâ special status and how Jewish law was recognized in Italy, tracing the history of rabbinical courts in medieval Italian states. He also wrote many articles on Mantuan Jewish history, the names and history of ancient Jewish families, and other general interest topics. His entire scope of studies remains unmatched due to his thorough research in countless libraries and state archives in Italy and abroad and his extensive analysis of every uncovered document.
My father was fluent in French and German and had a profound knowledge of several additional languages, especially Latin and ancient Greek. His effortless understanding of these languages, meant that in his writings he often switched from one language to another in the most natural and nonchalant way. Here, I occasionally ventured into the translation of a few quotes but, lacking my fatherâs multilingual knowledge, the task of dealing with languages other than Italian, including archaic Italian, was far beyond my modest possibilities. For the vast majority, the quotes were therefore left in their original language. The AI-based translation applications available today can be used to make at least a rough and general sense out of those citations.
My father was both an eminent historian and a distinguished scholar, whereas I am a retired marine microbiologist more familiar with molecular methods for diagnosing aquatic organismsâ diseases than with terminology of legal theory. âJewish Law and Italian Local Lawsâ was written in the early 1940s, in Italian, for an Italian audience. Languages are evolving creatures with a life of their own. Writing styles have since changed in both Italian and English. Furthermore, mine is a translation, i.e., a rendition in readable English without losing sight of my fatherâs interpretation of antique texts in Latin, ancient Greek, archaic German, Italian and French. Therefore, while asking for your leniency for some word choices and sentence structures that may sound slightly odd today, for any doubts you may have about how I translated certain legal terms, I strongly urge you to check my fatherâs original Legge Ebraica e Leggi Locali (Giuffrè ed., Milan, 1945).
Angelo Colorni, PhD