Zifroni, Israel ben Daniel
ZIFRONI, ISRAEL BEN DANIEL
ZIFRONI, ISRAEL BEN DANIEL (16th century), Hebrew printer. Zifroni was a native of Guastalla, near Padua, Italy, and lived in Gazzuolo. In 1567 he worked as corrector in *Sabbioneta for Vicenzo Conti, who produced three works, among them Menahem b. Zeraḥ's halakhic compendium Ẓeidah la-Derekh. The period of his finest achievements was 1578–83, when among other works he printed a fine edition of the Talmud (1578–80) for Ambrosius Froben in *Basle, and a Pentateuch with haftarot, the Five Scrolls, etc. (1583) for Th. Guarin. Because of difficulties with the Basle city fathers, Froben and Zifroni printed some of their works in *Freiburg-im-Breisgau, such as Aaron of Pesaro's Toledot Aharon, Benjamin of Tudela's Masot, and a Judeo-German paraphrase of Berechiah ha-Nakdan's Mishlei Shu'alim (1584). Zifroni eventually returned to Italy, where he worked for Di Gara of Venice as corrector (from 1588). Zifroni's son moses elishama also became a Hebrew printer and was active in *Mantua for T. Ruffinelli and the brothers I. and S. Norzi (1593–97), after which he joined his father in Venice.
bibliography:
D.W. Amram, Makers of Hebrew Books in Italy (1909), index; M. Steinschneider, Juedische Typographie (19382), 2ff.; J. Prijs, Baseler hebraeische Drucke (1964), index.