Shortly after his arrival at Columbia, Baron set to work enhancing its collection to world-class status. He purchased hundreds of manuscripts from David Fraenkel, a bookseller in Vienna whose collections were world-renowned. An article in the New York Times described “650 manuscripts in Hebrew characters, more than twenty manuscripts in Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Spanish, Italian and Greek . . . from Babylon, Baghdad, Greece, Italy, Spain, Turkey and Yemen.” 

A sample of the manuscripts acquired by Baron:

But Baron was not only acquiring - he was studying and publishing the manuscripts as well: A passing line in his The Jewish Community: Its History and Structure to the American Revolution refers to the sale of a fourteenth-century manuscript (“now in the Columbia University Library”) for twenty-six gold ducats as part of a discussion on the cost of manuscripts in the medieval period.

Along with the broader collection was a group of manuscripts relating to the Jewish Communities of Greece. An exhibition in 2022 highlighted this collection and its colorful and important manuscripts. Baron published scholarship relating to this community as well: on the redemption of captives, general community activities, and disputes between the Italian and native Greek Jews on the island of Corfu.

For more on the Jews of Corfu, check out our joint exhibition with the Jewish Theological Seminary!