Biography
Rabbi Petachiah ben Yaakov of Regensburg was a chacham of Germany and Bohemia of the twelfth century and the beginning of the thirteenth, known for the account of the journey he made from Germany to Bavel and Eretz Yisrael, visiting the Jewish communities along the way. He was born at Regensburg, whose community was known for its piety and learning, and was the brother of Rabbi Yitzchak HaLavan, one of the Baalei HaTosafot and the leading halachic authority of the Jews of Prague, where Petachiah settled. In his youth he learned from chachamim of Regensburg including Rabbi Yehudah HeChasid. He wrote glosses on the Gemara as well.
He set out about 1175, apparently wishing to daven at the graves of the tzaddikim, traveling through Poland, the Rus of Kiev, Crimea, the land of the Kuzarim, Georgia, Armenia, Kurdistan, Bavel, Syria and Eretz Yisrael. In Bavel he was much taken with the manner of learning in the yeshivot and with the standing of the communities, which the successors of the Geonim still headed, and he received from them a letter of recommendation that wherever he went the local Jews should show him the graves of the tzaddikim.
What he found in Eretz Yisrael was altogether different. Few Jews remained after the Crusades, and in Yerushalayim, which he reached before 1187, he found one Jew alone, a dyer by trade, who remained by special permission of the Crusaders because they made use of his craft; besides Yerushalayim he counts communities at Chevron, Acco and Teveria. Much of his account is given to the graves of tzaddikim and the holy places, and some of his descriptions served chachamim of later generations in identifying those places again.
He entrusted his notes to Rabbi Yehudah HeChasid, who set them down as the travelogue known as Sibuv, so he had returned to Regensburg no later than 5977/1217, the year Rabbi Yehudah HeChasid was niftar. The sefer was first printed at Prague in 5355/1595 and has appeared in some twenty-four editions since, rendered into the principal languages of Europe. His descriptions remain a source for the life of the Jews of the East in that period and for the knowledge of Eretz Yisrael in his day; streets in several cities carry his name.
Where traditions differ. The dates of the travels are uncertain and are placed roughly between 1170 and 1187. ; The sefer does not describe his return to Germany after Greece; the account may have been lost. ; According to Yehoshua Prawer the travelogue passed through at least two and probably three editings before reaching its present form.
פתחיה בן יעקב מרגנסבורג היה נוסע יהודי מפורסם בן המאה ה-12, שכתב תיאור של מסעו. הוא ערך מסע מגרמניה לבבל ולארץ ישראל וביקר בכל הקהילות היהודיות בדרך. פתחיה היה אחיו של רבי יצחק הלבן, מבעלי התוספות.
Petachiah of Regensburg, also known as Petachiah ben Yakov, Moses Petachiah, and Petachiah of Ratisbon, was a German/Bohemian rabbi of the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. At some point he left his place of birth, Regensburg in Bavaria, and settled in Prague. He is best known for the description he wrote to document his extensive travels during the late twelfth century throughout Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and the Middle East. He visited places such as Poland, Russia, Syria, Armenia, and Greece. His work was later published, apparently in an abridged form, in a travelogue that eventually became known under the title Travels of Rabbi Petachia of Ratisbon.
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