Peri (Pflaum), Hiram
PERI (Pflaum), HIRAM
PERI (Pflaum ), HIRAM (Heinz ; 1900–1962), Romance and Renaissance scholar. Born in Berlin, Peri's doctoral dissertation, published in 1926, was devoted to the Jewish Renaissance philosopher Leone Ebreo (Judah *Abrabanel). In 1925 he immigrated to Palestine and in 1927 became assistant librarian at the Jewish National and University Library, Jerusalem. From 1928 Peri lectured on Romance languages and literature and on the history of Renaissance literature at the Hebrew University (from 1948 as professor).
Peri's scholarly interests extended to a wide range of subjects. He wrote many articles on the history of the theater, on Ladino grammar and poetry, on the relations between Church and Synagogue and religious disputations in the Middle Ages. He edited and annotated the Hebrew edition of Burkhardt's classic Kultur der Renaissance in Italien, with a supplement of his own (Tarbut ha-Renaissance be-Eiropah; 1949, 1953), and served as an editor and contributor in his field with the Encyclopedia Hebraica. A volume of studies was published in his memory (Romanica et Occidentalia, ed. by M. Lazar (1963), and contains a bibliography of works by Peri, see pp. 17–22).
bibliography:
G. Scholem and M. Lazar, Al Professor Ḥiram Peri (1964).