Al-Ousta Codex
Al-Ousta Codex, also known under its library classification BnF 1314-1315, is a 14th-century illuminated Bible codex containing the 24 canonical books of the Hebrew Bible, written in Sephardi square script with the Tiberian sublinear vocalisation, minuscule trope symbols, and the Masorah Magna and Parva. Others place the writing of the codex in the 15th century. The manuscript was purchased by ethnographer Jacob Sapir in San'a, Yemen in 1859, who carried it with him to France. Today, the manuscript is housed at the Bibliotheque Nationale de Paris.
Although purchased in Yemen, the manuscript is not of Yemenite Jewish provenance, as it shows no signs of the ancient Yemenite Jewish tradition of orthography, but of the Sephardic Jewish tradition of orthography. Prior to its debut in Yemen, the manuscript was in Egypt, where it was purchased by Aharon haCohen Iraqi, the visiting minister from Yemen and minter of the king's coins. Based on its colophon, one whose name was Sar-Shalom the nasi, the presumed head of the Sephardic Jewish community in Egypt and who lived in Cairo, had commissioned the manuscript's writing, and who had apparently been ordained and confirmed in his office by his brother, Shelomo Nasi, the exilarch.
Jacob Sapir's description
The Al-Ousta codex, named for its original Yemenite Jewish owner whose descendants were coined the name "al-Ousta", was described by Jacob Sapir in 1872, who brought its attention to the western world. The MS. was purchased by Sapir from the grandchildren of a certain David ben Saʻīd al-Ṣārum in San'a, whose grandfather, in turn, had acquired it in 1795 from a certain Abraham al-Manzeli, who, in turn, purchased it from the sons of Haroun Cohen-Iraqi, the grandchild of Aharon ha-Cohen Iraqi who purchased the codex in Egypt. They were driven to do so because of their extreme privation. Abraham Firkovich mentions also the codex in his writings. Sapir heaps lavish praises on the codex:...Also the precious Bible codex, the peculiar treasure of kings, in an extraordinarily beautiful handwriting upon parchment, which he had brought with him from Egypt or from Persia, it also was sold by his children's children in their poverty
The first volume of the book is adorned with an illuminated frontispiece and other decorative pages, showing a printed seven-branched candlestick and its appurtenances, using an old squeezing technique to produce a relief effect with gold tracings. In the words of Sapir, the codex measures "two-thirds of a cubit in length, and one-half of a cubit in width." It is written upon smooth and thin parchment that was split in half, having the same texture on both its sides. The layout of the codex is made with three columns to a page, with thirty lines to each column. The beginning of the codex contains a genealogical record thought to belong to its original owner, Sar-Shalom the nasi, who traces his lineage back to King David and to the First Man, Adam. The same genealogical record appears on p. 768 in the 13th and early 14th century Shem Ṭov Bible described by bibliophile David Solomon Sassoon, which leads to the conclusion that it may have been a standard form used at that time in codices. However, Sapir, in counting the number of generations that had passed since Sar-Shalom's ancestor, Bostanai, reasons that the time-frame given for this man who acquired the codex would have roughly been accurate.