SACCUTO, or SAKKUTO (xrn.z), also called Saccut (n):?), ABRAHAM B. SAMUEL, a celebrated astronomer, mathematician, historian, and lexico grapher, was born in Salamanca about A.D. I450. His distinguished talents secured for him the pro fessorial chair of astronomy at Saragossa ; and when he, together with 3oo,000 of his Jewish brethren, had to quit Spain, in consequence of the infamous edict for the expulsion of the Jews, issued by Ferdinand and Isabella, March 30, 1492, Saccuto repaired to Portugal, where King Em manuel appointed him chronographer and astro nomer-royal. His literary labours were, however, soon interrupted, for in 1496 the Jews were also expelled from Portugal, and Saccuto had to quit the country of his adoption and to seek an asylum in Tunis. It was here that he completed, in 1504— (1.) The famous chronicle entitled r71114 it:), the Book of Genealogies, which comprises a chronologi cal history of the Jews from the creation to A.M. 5260=A.D. 1500. In this elabomte work Saccuto gives an account of—i. The oral law as transmitted from Moses through the elders, prophets, sages, etc. ; ii. The acts and monuments of the kings of Israel, as well as of the surrounding nations, in a rhronological order ; iii. The Babylonian colleges at Sora and Pumbadita ; iv. The events which. occurred during the period of the second temple ; v. The different sects of that period—viz. the Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and Nazarites ; vi. The Nesiim Gaonim (conNa), or the , princes of the captivity, and the rectors of the col leges aftei the close of the Talmud ; and viz'. The
post-Gaonim period, down to the end of the 15th century. Saccuto composed this work in imita tion of a very ancient and important chronicle, juchasin, mentioned in the Talmud (Pesachim, 62 b), now lost. It is an encycloixedia of Jewish literature, and is indispensable to the student ot Hebrew antiquities. It was first published at Con stantinople 1566, then with sundry additions and glosses, Cracow 1581 ; Amsterdam 1717 ; Konigs berg 1857 ; and from a MS. in the Bodleian library, with many corrections, additions, etc., by Filipowski, London 1857. It is to this excellent edition that the references in this cyclopmdia are made. Saccuto also wrote (2.) A Rabbinic Ara maic Lexicon to the Chaldee paraphrases, the Midrashim, and Talmud, entitled -1DD9 invn, which consists of—i. Additional references to passages containing the words given by R. Nathan's Aruch [NATHAN]; ii. New forms of the words ex plained by R. Nathan ; id. References to the works wherein they occur ; and iv. Of an independent supplement containing about eighty new articles. This work has not as yet been published, hut Geiger gives an elaborate account of it, and specimens from it, in the Zeitschri j? der deutschen morgenliindi schen Gesellschaft, vol. xii. p. 144, ff., Leipzig 1858. He also wrote sundry theological and astro nomical works, which are enumerated by Stein schneider, Catalogus Hebr. Libr. Bibliotheca Bodleiana,p. 7o6, etc. ; Ffirst, Bibliotheca 200, etc.—C. D. G.