Pigit, Samuel ben Shemaria
PIGIT, SAMUEL BEN SHEMARIA
PIGIT, SAMUEL BEN SHEMARIA (1849–1911), Karaite scholar from Chufut-Qaleh, who was a descendant of Simhah Isaak *Luzki. He studied in Chufut-Qaleh and afterwards in Yevpatoria. He was a ḥazzan and a teacher of Torah in the communities of Karasubazar (1868–78), Simferopol (1878–82), and in Yekaterinoslav from 1882 until his death. Pigit was one of the last Crimean Karaite scholars who wrote Hebrew. He had a wide knowledge of Rabbanite literature and used in his pure Hebrew a great number of words, expressions, and quotations from the Talmud and from rabbinic literature. He was also interested in the research of Jewish studies. Some of his works were published: Iggeret Nidḥei Yisrael (St. Petersburg, 1894), which contains sermons and liturgical poems in Hebrew and the Karaite language, his own memories, and some information on the history of Crimean Karaites; Davar Davur (Warsaw, 1904; reprint Ramleh, 1977) includes Oriental fables and Karaite proverbs in his Hebrew translation from the Karaite language. He also published two poems in the Karaite language (K. Zh., 5–6 (1911), 15–16). Other works by Pigit that remained in manuscript and never published were lost. He had a large collection of manuscripts.
bibliography:
B. Elyasevich, Materialy k serii narody i kultury, 14, kn. 2 (1993), 166–67.
[Golda Akhiezer (2ed ed.)]