Shiviti

A shiviti is a plaque or paper inscribed with Psalms 16:8 "I am ever mindful of the Lord's presence." This example is highly unusual in that its purpose as set forth by the biblical quotation at top center is combined with a detailed topographic map of holy sites of the land of Israel. The map is oriented from west to east with the Mediterranean Sea in the foreground and the Dead Sea at top right. This is the viewpoint found in the earliest printed Hebrew map published in Amsterdam in 1620/1 and widely dispersed in the map of the very popular Amsterdam Haggadah of 1695. Major sites on this map are distinguished by the title "the holy city;" they are Jerusalem, Safed, Hebron and Tiberius (in descending order of size and importance). An amusing detail is the steamship flying a Turkish flag in the foreground, which is explained by the artist's inscription found in the bottom corners (at right) "The scribe�Moses Ganbash�written in Istanbul" (at left) "In the year 'Look to the Lord; be strong and of good courage; O look�'" (Ps. 2 7:14). This last sentence is a chronogram yielding the date 1838/9.

Panoramic maps like this one, which list the holy sites of Judaism and emphasize places associated with famous religious leaders, were very popular in the 19th century. The earliest related work dates 1837 and was hand-drawn by Hayyim Shleimah Luria from Tiberius. Later examples, based on an original by a Safed artist, were published in Germany and Poland during the last quarter of the century. The Jewish Museum work, though similar to the others, differs from them in details and is more elaborate both in technique and composition. The ground lines of the map and extensive areas of the border (like the flowering vines) are formed of cut paper collage. Further, the broad outer border of the top and sides does not appear on the other maps. This border contains, at bottom, the artist's name and date of the work (mentioned above) inscribed within aediculae. Above, on either side, is a representation of Jericho whose seven walls are depicted as a maze inscribed: "Now Jericho was shut up tight�" (Joshua 6:1). Above the mazes are ornamental gates, each bearing an urn planted with a grape vine; the urn and vine are repeated on either side of the shiviti quotation at top center. Finally, there are mystical prayers inscribed in the top corners.

The purpose of these panoramic maps is set forth in the inscription of the inner borders: to remind the viewer of the places and people associated with the land of Israel. It is a purpose which harmonizes well with that of a shiviti, since the land of Israel and the events that took place there are major themes of Jewish liturgy. Moses Ganbash's achievement was to combine the two forms within a single composition that is further unified by the repetition in the border of motifs found on the central map. The architectural frames of the inscriptions and the gateways echo the buildings on the map, and the mazes are themselves a type of map.

Source: Norman L. Kleeblatt and Vivian B. Mann. TREASURES OF THE JEWISH MUSEUM. New York: The Jewish Museum, 1986, pp. 128-129.