abraham of toledo 26 from Arabic into Castilian under the patronage of the king in → Toledo and Burgos. Together with ive other prominent Jews of the royal court, he was kidnapped in 1270 by rebellious nobles demanding the elimination of taxes. He was restored to his position in 1275. He died in 1294. Abraham’s translations include La escala de Mahoma (he Ladder of Muḥ ammad), an account of the Miʿrāj, or heavenly journey, of the Prophet (before 1264, not extant); Ibn al- Haytham’s Libro de la constitucion del universo (Ar. Kitāb fī Hayʾat al-ʿĀlam; ater 1270); and Azarchiel’s (al-Zarqālī’s) Libro de la Açafeha (Ar. al-Ṣ afīh ̣ a, a revision of an earlier transla- tion by Fernando of Toledo; 1277). he translation program sponsored by Alfonso called for renderings as literal and accurate as possible, and this is the main char- acteristic of Abraham’s translations. he trea- tise on the açafeha (astrolabic plate) is an example of the king’s program: a second trans- lation of this work was commended to Abra- ham of Toledo (and Bernardo el Arabigo) because the king found unsatisfactory the irst one (by Master Fernando of Toledo). With respect to Abraham’s attitude toward transla- tion, the Libro de la constitucion del universo proves that his knowledge of astronomy was limited and he had not mastered some of its most technical details, for he failed to detect mistakes in the original Arabic and reproduced them in his translation (Samsó 1990). Con- cerning his language, it constitutes a striking combination of literalism and freedom. He did not use the already coined terms for astronom- ical terms in Arabic, felt free to reorganize the contents and chapter divisions of the original work, and introduced summaries and interpo- lations (Samsó 1990). His main contribution to the so-called School of Toledo was the organi- zation and division into chapters of the trans- lated works. Bibliography Bossong, Georg. Probleme der Übersetzung wissen- schatlicher Werke aus dem Arabischen in das Altspanische zur Zeit Alfons des Weisen (Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 1979). Chabás, José, and Bernard Goldstein. he Alphonsine Tables of Toledo (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic, 2003). Gil, José S. La escuela de traductores de Toledo y los colaboradores judíos (Toledo: Instituto provincial de investigaciones y estudios toledanos, 1985). Romano, David. La ciencia hispanojudía (Madrid: Mapfre, 1992). Roth, Norman. “Jewish Collaborators in Alfonso’s Scientiic Work,” in Emperor of Culture: Alfonso X the Learned of Castile and His hirteenth Century Renaissance, ed. Robert I. Burns (Philadelphia: Uni- versity of Pennsylvania Press, 1990), pp. 59–71. Samsó, Julio. “El original árabe y la versión alfonsí del Kitāb fī hay’at al-ʿālam de Ibn al-Haytham,” in Ochava esfera y astrofísica. Textos y estudios sobre las fuentes árabes de la astronomía de Alfonso X, ed. M. Comes, H. Mielgo, and J. Samsó (Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona-Instituto Millás Vallic- rosa, 1990), pp. 115–131. Josefina Rodríguez Arribas Abravanel Family he Sephardi family name Abravanel, irst mentioned around 1300, became famous among Jews in Spain in the iteenth century. Ater the expulsion in 1492, members of the family were scattered in Italy, North Africa, and the → Ottoman Empire. Others were bap- tized in Portugal at the time of the forced con- version of 1497 but as marranos preserved the name clandestinely and revived it in the seven- teenth century in the Sephardi communities of Amsterdam, London, and the New World. One of the largest branches of the Abravanel family settled in Naples, where throughout the iteenth and early sixteenth centuries they were community leaders, inanciers, philoso- phers, and exegetes. he most noted members of this branch of the family were Don Isaac Abravanel (1437–1508) and his son Judah (ca. 1460–ater 1523). Isaac had been a → court Jew in Portugal, serving, like his father before him, as treasurer of Alfonso V. He was also a philosopher and wrote commentaries on → Maimonides. However, he is best known as for his extensive Bible commentary. Judah Abravanel, also known as Leone Ebreo, was a physician and Hebrew poet, and one of the leading philosophers of the Renaissance. He is best known for his metaphysical work Dialoghi di Amore, which appeared in many editions and translations and had enormous inluence in the