Caleb Afendopolo

Caleb Afendopolo (born at Adrianople before 1430; lived some time at Belgrade, and died about 1499 at Constantinople) was a Jewish polyhistor. He was the brother of Samuel ha-Ramati, ḥakam of the Karaite congregations in Constantinople and of Judah Bali, brother-in-law and disciple of Elijah Bashyatzi.

According to a notice found in a Paris manuscript, he supported himself by giving private instruction; but this is questioned by Steinschneider. A pupil of Mordecai Comtino at Adrianople, Afendopolo attained great proficiency in science, and, while lacking depth and originality of thought, distinguished himself by prolific literary production, based on his large library, that included rare manuscripts, partly bought, partly copied by himself. He continued Adderet Eliyahu (Elijah's Mantle), a work on Karaite law left unfinished in his charge by his teacher, Bashyatzi, in 1490.

The wife of Bashyatzi, who was Afendopolo's sister, having died before her husband, Afendopolo no longer referred to Bashyatzi as his brother-in-law, but called him teacher. Afendopolo died before completing Bashyatzi's treatise.

Afendopolo's own works give a fair insight into the erudition of the Karaites. Fragments only of many of them have been brought to light by Jonah Hayyim Gurland in his Ginze Yisrael (Lyck, 1865), and less exactly by A. Firkovitch. His writings are:

Afendopolo also wrote some penitential hymns which are to be found in the Karaite Maḥzor (Neubauer, Catalogue, No. 2369, 3; Zunz, G. V., p. 425; idem, 2nd ed., p. 440); but most of these hymns were taken from Rabbinite poets (see David Kahana in Oẓar ha-Sifrut, vol. v, Cracow, 1896). Afendopolo had intended to translate the Elements of Euclid, and to write commentaries on Jabir ibn Aflaḥ's Kitab al-Ḥiyyah (Compendium on Astronomy) and on Ptolemy's Almagest.

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