Beifuß Josephus Wallich

Source: Jona Schellekens, The Wallich List from Worms. Aschkenas 25 (2015): 181-204.

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The first sign of life is from Bonn in 1591, in a note in one of three manuscripts once owned by Joseph, now in the Bodleian Library in Oxford. A Hebrew book on biology printed in Venice in 1550, before the war in a private collection, contains notes and copies of several letters written by Joseph himself. He testifies that he was a doctor of medicine (M.D.) with a degree from the University of Padua. He calls himself in Latin “Belga Hebraeus,” literally a Hebrew Belgian. In the sixteenth century the name of the former Roman province, Belgica, was first used as a synonym for the Netherlands, an area that evolved into modern Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxemburg. Thus, Joseph seems to have spent some time in the Netherlands with his father. The annual lists of the selling of מצוות in the Green Book mention him (וייבש וולך) in the years 1592/3-94/5. Around 1594, Joseph built his house “zur [=in the] Blume,” next to a tower in the town wall called the Scharfrichterturm. In 1603/4 he was a practicing physician in Mainz. A list of Jewish households mentions him in 1605. The list of Jewish households in Worms from 1610 mentions that “Beifuβ Josephi, Medicus at the Blume and his housewife Vögele have six children, namely: Evchen, Elisabeth, Lazarus, Salomon, Mündle (all single) and Rosina. … [The house] has two heated rooms, a study, three [other] rooms and one cellar.” He declared to have built his house sixteen years earlier. The list of Jewish households of December 1619 mentions the physician Beifuβ Josephus at the Blume with wife and four children. The list of Jewish households in Worms of 1642 mentions the physician Beifuβ zur Blumen in Frankenthal. It is unlikely that he was living there, because very few Jews were allowed to live there. More likely, he was there to treat patients. The Memorbuch of Worms lists Joseph (יוסף וייבש בר משה מאיר) without date of death. The Green Book, however, mentions his death in 1643. For sources see Jona Schellekens, “The Wallich list from Worms,” Aschkenas 25 (2015): 181-204.