Edelmann, Raphael
EDELMANN, RAPHAEL
EDELMANN, RAPHAEL (1902–1972), Danish scholar and librarian. Born in Latvia, Edelmann immigrated to Copenhagen as a child. In 1933 at the recommendation of David *Simonsen he began working in the newly established Jewish department of the Royal Library of Copenhagen, which consisted of the rich library of Simonsen; from 1938 he headed the department. From 1948 he lectured at the University of Copenhagen, where he was in charge of Judaic studies, including Yiddish. In 1955 he founded the Association of Libraries of Judaica and Hebraica in Europe and in this capacity organized training courses for Jewish librarians. Edelmann published extensively in several scholarly fields and made important contributions to the dissemination of Jewish scholarship in Denmark. Among his works are Bestimmung, Heimat and Alter der synagogalen Poesie (1932), and Zur Fruehgeschichte des Machzor (1934), important works on the early history of liturgical poetry. He compiled the catalog of Hebrew incunabula of the library of L. *Goldschmidt, now at the Royal Library (in Fund og Forskning, 3 (1956), 82–90); edited the series Corpus Codicum Hebraicorum Medii Aevi (1954– ); and edited the Subject Concordance to the Babylonian Talmud by L. Goldschmidt (1959). He also arranged successful exhibitions of the treasures of the Royal Library in Paris, Strasbourg, Milan, and New York.
[Menahem Schmelzer]