"Torah crowns" – Pair of Torah finials. Mountain Jews (Caucasus Region – Azerbaijan? Dagestan?), [19th century].
Silver, cast and engraved.
Torah finials ("crowns"), with spherical body surmounted by cylindrical segment in turn surmounted by additional spherical ornament. A band encompasses the circumference of the body, dividing the sphere into upper and lower hemispheres. Suspended from this band are chains with bells. Chains with metal disks that act like bells are suspended from the cylindrical segment surmounting the body. Long tapering shafts, with engraved Hebrew dedicatory inscriptions: "Sanctified to the Almighty, from Mordechai son of Menashe Taharani."
As was the case with the Jews of Afghanistan, among the Mountain Jews of the Caucasus Region, Torah finials were known in Hebrew as "Keter Torah" ("Torah Crown"). The shape of Torah finials known to us from these countries was influenced by the design of Persian finials; up until the Russian conquest of the eastern Caucasus in 19th century, the Mountain Jews were, in effect, like the Jews of Bukhara, part of the cultural sphere of Persian Jewry. Moreover, the geographic proximity of Iran to the Caucasus Region readily enabled population exchanges, and mutual influence on material culture. Thus, for instance, we know of a pair of Torah finials of the Georgian type bearing a dedicatory inscription of the Sephardic Persian-Jewish community living in the city of Baku, capital of Azerbaijan.
Height: 20.5-21 cm. Minor fractures. Old soldering repairs.
Reference: Mountain Jews: Customs and Daily Life in the Caucasus, pp. 51-57.