So, I have probably offhandedly mentioned in the past that Ashkenazi and Sepharadi Jews had a lot of mutual influence on each other through the generations. If I didn't mention that - well, now you know. Usually, my focus for such topics is religious and halachic discussion - so you'll see me talk about Ramban and Rashba studying from the Tosafot writers, or the rabbis of Provence's admiration of Rambam - which they shared with Yemenite Jews, even if the latter group was more isolated and thus thiks influence was more pronounced. Alternatively, I could talk about Ibn Ezra's tendency to travel, and how he always corresponds with Rashi in his commentary on the Torah.
Today, however, I would like to talk about the handwriting system. You see, most every Israeli knows how to write the Hebrew so-called cursive. And while it's mostly prevalent among religious Jews, the Rashi script is known and can be readable. Why am I mentioning them side by side, you ask? Well, that's very simple. Both are handwriting scripts, for different communities: the Rashi script, despite its name, is the Sepharadi (or perhaps Italian? Though a Yemenite friend of mine writes in it as well) one, and the modern Hebrew "cursive" is the Ashkenazi one. I suppose that's kind of Ashkenormativity, but I'm not so sure of that - because of the next part. You see, the Rashi script got its name for a reason.
Sure, the reason's no mystery. Everyone can tell you that Rashi is written in the Rashi script. Some can even tell you that nearly all old books are written in this script - regardless of whether or not they're Sepharadi books. I honestly don't have anything grand to say here - it's simply that the first Hebrew printing presses were in Spain and Italy, and that some of the Italian Hebrew publishers were running away from the Alhambra decree, meaning they were also Sepharadi. When they wanted to differentiate the commentary from the body of the text, they used their handwriting, which had nothing to do with Rashi's handwriting. Heck, I've lately seen a manuscript written by Rambam himself during a tour in the Israeli National Library, and it was written in this script. That doesn't prove anything about Rashi, but I don't think we have his handwriting and this is enough evidence that "Cətav Rambam" is a more appropriate name for this script. Oh, and considering in Kafka's time there was no one to regulate which handwriting was used - while this is very late in relation to everything else, this post that circulated lately with his handwriting is in some degree proof that modern Hebrew "cursive" is the Ashkenazi handwriting. If an expert on manuscript pops up here and mentions old Ashkenazi manuscripts with this script it'd be great
So, yeah. That's it. Don't know how interesting this post is. Thank you for reading and everything! I totally wasn't pushed to write this after seeing Kalonymus' book in Otzar HaḤochma written in the Sepharadi handwriting! Not that it matters, since Kalonymus was well travelled and a language scholar so he/she might've known multiple scripts, or he may have written in a special Provençal script I don't know of.
