[¹] Ephraim had evidently discarded his surname of “Ben-Israel” for “Soeiro,” that of his maternal grandfather, who probably left no male issue. In such cases, it was customary among Sephardi Jews for the second son of the eldest daughter to use his mother’s maiden surname exclusively, or add it to his own patronymic.
XXI.
Dr. Abraham Zacutus Lusitanus
He was one of the most eminent physicians of his time and the author of many valuable works in connection with his profession. He was a native of Lisbon and of marrano origin. In the year 1625, when Philip (1605–1665) IV. of Spain (1621–1665) and Portugal (1621–1640) banished the Jews from the latter kingdom, Zacutus escaped to Amsterdam from the clutches of the Holy Office. Here he was initiated into the Abrahamic covenant and lived as an exemplary Jew. He was one of the “Aprovaciones” of the first volume of the Conciliador “Sapientissimo Viro, Domino Menasseh Ben Israel, sacrorum librorum eruditissimo interpreti, Salvtem.... Amstelodami dié ultim. Mensis August. Anno. 1632.
Te summé colit, & observat,
Doctor Zacutus Lusitanus.”
Among his clientele he numbered the Elector Palatine Frederick V. (1596–1632), King of Bohemia (1619–1620), and his consort Elizabeth Stuart (1596–1662), eldest daughter of James (1566–1625) I., King of England (1603–1625). They were the parents of Sophia (1630–1714), Electress of Hanover, the mother of George (1660–1727) I. (1714–1727).
His great-grandfather was Abraham [Diogo Rodriguez] (1450?–post 1510) de Samuel de Abraham Zacut, the astronomer, mathematician and historian.
In 1473, while a professor in the University of his native town, Salamanca, he wrote his world-famous: ביאור לוחות׃ [B. M.] (Astronomical Tables), and here he became acquainted with Christopher Columbus (1446?–1506).