Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Ancient Tefillin




A fellow sofer showed me these exquisite ancient Tefillin, which he says are from northern Africa circa 1600's.
While I have no clue if this claim is right, I must note that beyond any doubt, these Tefillin were Psulim from the start. The four compartments of the Tefillin shel Rosh look like they're divided but when you open it, you see that instead of four there's only one big compartment - just like a Tefillin shel Yad. From the outside they made it look like a proper "bait" but that's just cosmetics.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

These are not so old : I have the tefillin of my grandfather who had bought them in 1915 new for his barmitzvah in Oran, Algeria, and they look exactly the same : same materials, same shape, same condition. 400 years-old tefillin would not be in such nice condition...

YK said...

I guess the seller was prepping up his merchandise..!