The printer Chaim Schachor from Prague is considered the first to print Hebrew texts in German-speaking countries. His description as an "itinerant printer" is mainly due to the difficult political conditions for Jews and economic constraints. When the order situation was weak, Chaim Schachor was able to use the workshops of Christian printers. If he had no opportunity to print, he earned his money as a bookseller.
Chaim Schachor had two children that we know of today; a son and a daughter. His son Isaac and son-in-law Joseph ben Jakar later joined the book printing business and supported Schachor. They demonstrably formed the beginning of the family's centuries-long letterpress tradition.
In Europe, letterpress printing amounted to a media revolution. With the printed book, access to knowledge and education came within reach for more and more people - but initially mainly for Christians, since the printing privilege was reserved primarily for Christian printers. Through Jewish itinerant printers like Chaim Schachor almost a century after the invention of printing finally Hebrew printed works became possible in German-speaking countries.
Today, no representations of Chaim Schachor have survived with certainty.
Chaim ben David Schachor was born around 1490 in Bohemia, probably in the Prague ghetto. Here he learned his trade from Gerson ben Solomon Kohen, the founder of the Prague printing dynasty of the Gersonids. Gerson ben Solomon Kohen headed a cooperative of Jewish printers and publishers for the publication of Hebraica. Chaim Schachor is credited with the graphic design and illustration of the books.
In 1527, Kohen was granted the privilege by Ferdinand I to be the only printer to publish Hebrew books in Bohemia. Thus Gerson ben Solomon Kohen was granted a monopoly on Hebrew book printing in Bohemia. Since there was consequently no longer any economic future for him there, Chaim Schachor left Prague.
In Oels near Breslau Chaim Schachor made himself independent. There, thanks to princely privileges, a small Jewish community formed again at the beginning of the 16th century, which even built its own synagogue. Together with his business partner David ben Jonathan, Chaim Schachor ran a print shop for Hebrew writings in an adjoining room of this synagogue around 1529.
On July 29, 1530, Shakhor and David ben Jonathan jointly brought out an edition of the Pentateuch in Oels.
But in Oels, despite the neighboring Wroclaw fairs, the distribution and sales opportunities were limited, or perhaps it was due to the political situation: evidence shows that around 1530 Jewish families were expelled from Oels, probably both went hand in hand. In any case: Chaim Schachor left Oels.
The next traces Schachor left behind were in Augsburg in 1532. Here he worked in the print shop of Silvan Otmar, which was located in the southern part of the old town near the monastery church of St. Ursula. With over 500 prints between 1515 and 1539, Otmar's print shop was one of the most productive and renowned of the era. It was the epicenter of Augsburg book production and form cutters and bookbinders settled in its vicinity. In the midst of it all was the Jewish book printer Chaim Schachor, who earned increasing renown and recognition for his work. Correspondence shows that Silvan Otmar even lobbied for permission to set up a printing shop in Ulm by the Augsburg book printer Sebastian Franck in collaboration with Chaim Schachor. The weight and influence of Hebrew letterpress printing is also indicated by this passage from the aforementioned correspondence:
"The other piece is this: a Jew is here, who has Hebrew letters and can set them himself, who wants to print Hebrew with him [Sebastian Franck], the same books are from time to time cash money, so he hoped in one year to gain several hundred guilders over all costs outside of the German books to print, which would also bear a good benefit; so the good, pious and learned man would come on green branch and would be helped that he (God willing) henceforth may never sew at the hunger cloth. This Jew is a pious man, everyone is not annoyed by him, waits alone for the printing, has been here [in Augsburg] in two or three years often and much with Boniface [Wolfart] for many weeks." ( Endriß 1967, p. 36f. quoted after Künast 2018, p. 283.)
Despite the prospect of a lucrative business through the printing of Hebrew texts, the cooperation with Ulm did not materialize. For Schachor, the cooperation would have meant an improvement in his financial circumstances. From 1533 on, Chaim Schachor lived with the preacher and theologian Bonifazius Wolfart in the so-called "Wunderhaus" near the Gögginger Tor during his stays in Augsburg. It was therefore possible for Jews to stay in the city in individual cases - despite their expulsion from the city since 1438/40. Whether against payment or surety, we do not know. Between 1532 and 1536 there is evidence of seven Schachor prints. For the next four years he earned his money as a bookseller. In 1540 and 1541 Schachor printed again in Augsburg. Son Isaac and son-in-law Josef ben Jakar were also involved in these prints for the first time.
In the summer of 1542, Chaim Schachor traveled to Ferrara with Paulus Aemilius Romanus to examine the possibility of jointly founding a printing house there. The relationship with Aemilius was mediated by the chief rabbi of Swabia, Rabbi Isaak von Günzburg (1506-1586). Aemilius worked as a professional scribe in 1538, copying Kabbalistic manuscripts on commission, including in Rome. There he converted to Christianity in the same year.
The journey of Chaim Schachor and Aemilius failed. This was probably due not only to tensions between them, but also to the rejection of the convert by the Jewish community, even though a respected rabbi had mediated their cooperation. Chaim Schachor had to bear the costs of the unsuccessful venture, as Aemilius successfully sued him for damages. Presumably, Schachor had to pledge his printing types to him. Printing thus became impossible for the time being.
In 1544 Chaim Schachor got his type apparatus back and went to Ichenhausen. Jews settled there for the first time in the first half of the 16th century. They were mainly families who had been expelled from imperial cities and principalities and - against payment of special taxes - were given refuge in villages and markets. The local lordship of Ichenhausen also took in Jews for financial reasons. Although they did not enjoy legal equality here, they were able to administer themselves.
In Ichenhausen, Isaac and his son-in-law Josef got firmly into the printing business. Together they printed a Hebrew Pentateuch and a prayer book for women in Yiddish. But they stayed only a short time. Around 1545/46, they already moved on.
The letterpress trio, consisting of Chaim Schachor, his son and son-in-law, moved on from Ichenhausen to Heddernheim near Frankfurt am Main. Here they printed together in 1546 two more publishing works: a Selichot and a commentary on Bechai by Naftali Hirz ben Elieser Treves. But even in Heddernheim, today a northern district of Frankfurt, Schachor did not settle down in the long term.
.In 1547, Chaim Schachor and his family settled in Lublin, where he died a few years later. However, members of the Schachor family kept the letterpress tradition alive in Lublin well into the 17th century.
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