Handwritten Leaf, Regulation Proscribing Mixed Dancing - Signed by Rabbi Yedidya Galante, a Safed Emissary - Ancona ...

Handwritten Leaf, Regulation Proscribing Mixed Dancing - Signed by Rabbi Yedidya Galante, a Safed Emissary - Ancona, 1615
Handwritten leaf, regulation of rabbis and community leaders of Ancona, proscribing mixed dancing, with signatures of local rabbis and notables including the signature of R. Yedidya son of R. Moshe Galante, Safed emissary. [Ancona (Italy), 1615].
"To fulfill the will of our Heavenly Father and to make a safeguard for the Torah… the sages and rabbis and committee members of the Italian community and of the Levantine community… No Jew can dance with any woman at any time…".
The regulation contains bans, warnings and curses on the person who transgresses these codes and states that this edict was enacted with the approval of the "vicarage of the His Majesty the Cardinal".
Added to the end of the regulation is a reservation, in a diffrent handwriting, that women can dance with male teachers during dancing lessons: "And it is worthwhile to clarify that men who teach women to dance, i.e. the Maestri di Baller can dance with them, only while they are teaching them…".
The regulations bear the signatures of rabbis and community notables alongside the signature of the famed sage R. Yedidya Galante a Safed emissary who stayed at that time in Ancona, who signed: "…Yedidya son of Moshe Galante". The other signatures: "David son of R. Yitzchak Franco", "Elimelech son of Yosef Tzorfati', "Elya Halalya of Cuneo", "Ya'akov son of R. Yishmael", "Refael Pintzo", "Shem Tov Ibn Haviv", "Moshe Refael… Ibn Haviv".
On the verso and on the following pages are inscriptions in Italian regarding the content of the regulation. The Hebrew text does not bear the name of the city and the date, however, they do appear in the Italian text.
R. Yedidya Galante, author of Chiddushei Galante, son of R. Moshe Galante (the first) of Safed (disciple of R. Yosef Karo and Rabbi of Safed). In 1607, he was sent from Safed as emissary to Italy, and in the month of Shevat 1607, wrote a responsum from Cuneo on the matter of an estate. In 1608, he printed his father's book of responsa in Venice to which he added novellae of Rishonim printed from manuscripts. R. Yehuda Aryeh of Modena writes of his meeting with R. Galante in Venice and that the latter recounted the greatness of the Ari to the sages of the Venice: "The sage R. Yedidya Galante, an emissary from Eretz Israel, arrived here and at that time the venerable sage R. Eliyahu Montalto lay ill… Many Torah scholars went to visit him… and while still there, Galante began recounting miracles and wonders performed by the Ari…" (Ari Nohem, Jerusalem, 1929, p. 80).
Avraham Ya'ari (in Sh'luchei Eretz Yisrael, p. 247) writes that the mission of R. Yedidya Galante to Italy ended in 1614, however this regulation enacted a short while later bears his signature. His novellae and rulings have been printed in his book Chiddushei Galante and at the end of his father's book of responsa.
Folded leaf (4 pages), 27.5 cm. Fair condition. Stains. Tear in the center, slightly affecting text. Folding creases and wear.