Shapero RARE BOOKS J G J G 106 New Bond Street
[email protected] www.shapero.com London W1S 1DN +44 (0)20 7493 0876 Contents Art and Photography 1 - 41 Voyages to Jerusalem 42 - 55 Zionism 56 - 81 Rabbinic 82 - 90 ‘Jerusalem of Gold’ (Yerushalayim Shel Zahav in Hebrew) is the name of the famous Israeli song written by Naomi Shemer (1930-2004), the Israeli songwriter hailed as the ‘first lady of Israeli song and poetry’. The song describes the Jewish people’s 2,000-years longing to return to Jerusalem. The expression ‘Jerusalem of Gold’ was first mentioned in a Talmud story and is assumed to be referring to a piece of golden jewelry in the shape of the walls of Jerusalem, possibly a crown, that a groom would gift his bride on their wedding night. It is the love story of Rabbi Akiva and his wife Rachel, which occurred about the second century AD in the land of Israel. In the story Rabbi Akiva tells his wife ‘if I had money I would buy you the Jerusalem of Gold’. Later the saying was applied to the view of the city walls together with Dome of the Rock at dusk and dawn, when they are lit by the sun’s rays and look as if they are all golden. Item 17 Art & Photography Shapero Rare Books 3 1. [MAYER, Luigi]. Veduta della probatica piscina nella città di Gerusalemme. [View of the Pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem.] c.1800. £6500 [ref: 90253] Attractive original watercolour which we can safely attribute to Mayer (fl.