This is the first edition of the ancient kabbalistic work known as Sefer HaKanah. In the introduction, the author gives his name as Kanah Even Gedor, a descendant of R. Nechuniah HaKanah, a master of Torah secrets. The author's introduction also tells of his son Nachum, saying that many kabbalistic secrets were revealed to him as early as the age of three, and the book incorporates various statements in his name ("The words of Even Gedor our father"; "And these are the words of my son Nachum").

The book was edited by R. Elazar Altschuler of Prague, who writes in the "proofreader's apologia" (p. 25b) that the commentary on the seventy-two-letter Holy Name was copied from an ancient parchment manuscript ("some hundreds of years old") which he found among the possessions of his father R. Avraham Chanoch of Prague (who told him he had found it in the Worms synagogue). R. Elazar added comments and explanations from later kabbalistic works.

The second edition of the book was printed in Wilhermsdorf, 1730, but omit several glosses by the first publisher which appear in the present edition.

Ownership inscription on front endpaper: "Granted to me by G-d, Itzik Fishel Ehrlich, formerly a shochet and second prayer leader in Kempen, and now in 1853 a prayer leader in Breslau".