Bonjorn, Bonet Davi(d)

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BONJORN, BONET DAVI(D)

BONJORN, BONET DAVI(D) , called De Barrio (14th century), Spanish physician and astronomer. He lived in Perpignan, where he also engaged occasionally in moneylending activities. Here he manufactured astronomical instruments for Pedro iv of Aragon. His wife exerted pressure on him to divorce her by withholding his astronomical instruments. His son, the famous astronomer jacob bonet or jacob poel drew up astronomical tables for the year 1361 for the latitude of this city. Jacob's son davi(d) bonet bonjorn was authorized to practice medicine at Perpignan in 1390 after examination by two Christian physicians. His baptism in 1391 is said to have occasioned the famous satiric pamphlet Al Tehi ka-Avotekha ("Be Not as Your Fathers") by his friend Profiat *Duran.

bibliography:

E.C. Girbal, Los Judíos en Gerona (1870); Renan, Ecrivains, 701, 742, 746; Baer, Urkunden, 1 (1929), 259; Baer, Spain, 2 (1965), index; S. Sorbrequés Vidal, Anales de Estudios Gerundenses (1947), 1–31; Millás Vallicrosa, in: Sefarad, 19 (1959), 365–71; F. Cantera Burgos, Alvar García de Santa María (1952), 318f.; Thorndike, in: Isis, 34 (1943), 6–7, 410.

[Cecil Roth]