Joseph ha-Kohen

Joseph ben Joshua ben Meïr ha-Kohen (also Joseph HaKohen, Joseph Hakohen or Joseph Hacohen) (December 20, 1496 in Avignon, France – 1575 or shortly thereafter, Genoa, Italy) was a historian and physician of the 16th century.

Joseph's family originally lived at Cuenca, Spain. When the Jews were expelled from Spain the family settled at Avignon. At the age of five Joseph left Avignon with his father and went to Genoa, where they remained until 1516. Driven from that city, they went to Novi, but returned to Genoa in 1538, where Joseph practiced medicine for twelve years. On June 3, 1550, he and all his coreligionists were driven from Genoa as a consequence of the rivalry of the non-Jewish physicians. Joseph then settled at Voltaggio, at the request of the citizens of that small town, practicing there until 1567. When the Jews were driven out of the territory of Genoa, he went to Costeletto (Montferrat), where he was very well received. In 1571 he was again established at Genoa, where he died a few years later.

Joseph ha-Kohen had three sons (Joshua, Isaac, Judah) and two daughters. As for his brother Todros, he has tentatively been identified by Robert Bonfil with Ludovico Carretto, who is known to have converted from Judaism. Joseph ha-Kohen was highly regarded as a historian and physician. One of his chief concerns was also the release of the many Jewish captives taken by the vessels of the Italian republics and by the Corsairs; as in 1532, when Andrea Doria captured many Jews on taking Coron, Patras, and Zante; in 1535, when the emperor Charles V took Tunis; in 1542, when the galleys of Cegala Visconti had imprisoned a number of Jews.

In Hebrew literature Joseph ha-Kohen achieved prominence by two historical works. His major work, Dibre ha-Yamim le-Malke Zarfat we-'Otoman (Chronicles of the Kings of France and Turkey), is in the nature of a history of the world, in the form of annals, in which he represents the sequence of events as a conflict between Asia and Europe, between Islam and Christianity, the protagonist for Islam being the mighty Turkish empire, and for Christianity, France. With these two great groups he connects European history, beginning with the downfall of the Roman empire. In this he also includes narratives of persecutions of Jews during the first and second crusades, copied from eye-witness reports available to him in manuscript. The work was printed in 1554 at Venice but later put on index (Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin). It was reprinted in Amsterdam in 1733. Parts were translated into German and French; the entire work was issued in English, but badly translated, by Bialloblotzky. He continued, however, the work on it, as is evident from autographs preserved in British Library.

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