14 See p.81.
15 See Epstein, <I>Die nach Raschi genannten Gebaude in Worms.</I>
16 This is the epoch which marks the arrival of Jews in Great Britain. They went there, it seems, In the suite of William the Conqueror (1066) - They always remained in touch with their co-religionists on the Continent, and were sometimes called by these "the Jews of the Island." For a while they enjoyed great prosperity, which, joined to their religious propaganda, drew upon them the hatred of the clergy. Massacred in 1190, exploited and utterly ruined in the thirteenth century, they were finally exiled in 1290.
17 See p.39.
18 Surnamed "Segan Leviya," supposed—doubtless incorrectly—to have come originally from Vitry in Champagne. He was a very conscientious pupil of Eliezer the Great. Died about 1070.
19 He is the author of the famous Aramaic poem read at the Pentecost, beginning with the words <I>Akdamot Millin.</I> He must not be confounded with his contemporary of the same name, Meir ben Isaac (of Orleans?), to whom also some liturgic poems are attributed. Another rabbi of Orleans, Isaac ben Menahem (according to Gross, <I>Gallia judaica,</I> pp.32-3, probably the father of Meir), was older than Rashi, who quotes some of his Talmudic explanations, and some of the notes written on his copy of the Talmud. There is nothing to prove, as Gross maintains, that Rashi was his pupil. It is not even certain that he knew him personally.
20 See p.77 for Rashi's relations to his teachers.
21 A Responsum signed by Rashi shows that he was the tutor of the children of a certain Joseph, whose father had been administrator of the community.
22 For a long time it was thought and said that once when Rashi was sick, he dictated a Responsum to his daughter. As Zunz was the first to show, this story about Rashi's secretary is based upon the faulty reading of a text. Another legend proved false! Science is remorseless. See <I>Sefer ha- Pardes,</I> ed. Constantinople, 33d, where one must read, <H>uleven bat (Vav Lamed Bet Final_Nun, Bet Tav)</H> not <H>velajen biti (Vav Lamed Kaf Final_Nun, Bet Tav Yod)</H> - See Zunz, <I>Zur Geschichte,</I> p.567, and Berliner, <I>Hebraische Bibliographie,</I> XI; also, <I>Monatsschrift,</I> XXI.
23 As has been shown (chap. II, p.51) Rashi may have begun to
write commentaries upon the Talmud during his sojourn In
Lorraine. However that may be, it is difficult to
dlstinguish in this huge production between the work of his
youth and that of his maturity or old age.