Hebrew-Russian and Russian-Hebrew Dictionaries ed. by L.I. Mandelstam , 2 vol., 1st and only ed.,1859,1860, 

St. Petersburg Hebrew-Russian Dictionary, Publication of the Ministry of Public Education, 1859, 

524 pp. 323 pp. and 23 pp.

Condition: some light stains to several first and last pages Russian-Hebrew Dictionary, 

Publication of the Ministry of Public Education, 1860, 933 pp. 

Condition: moderate foxing throughout the book. 1st and only editions. 

New leather stamped leather binding, marmoreal endpapers, gold lettering to spine, size: 22 x 16 cm. 

Total weight: 1760 

Leon Iosifovich Mandelstam (1819-1889) was a Russian public figure, poet, translator, and publicist. He was one of the first Jewish students at Moscow University. He was the first Jewish graduate of St. Petersburg University, where he graduated from the Faculty of History and Philosophy in 1844 with a PhD in philosophy (in general literature). He developed a plan for reforming Jewish schools and translated the Tanakh from Hebrew into Russian. Until 1857, he served as a Jewish scholar attached to the Minister of Public Education. Mandelshtam works included an early translation of the Torah, possibly the first, into Russian as well as translations of many Psalms. He also produced Russian to Hebrew and Hebrew to Russian dictionaries. Rejected by his family for seeking secular education, Mandelshtam would publish a book of poems in Russian about the dreams and doubts of Jewish youth who sought to break away from their communities and pursue secular education.[6] His first publication was a collection of his poems that were compiled in 1840 and approved by the censors for publishing in June of 1841, notably being the first collection of Russian poetry written by a Jewish author. While working for the Russian Ministry of Public Education in the 1840's, Mandelshtam published several textbooks in the Russian language. In 1864 Mandelshtam published a dramatic prose story titled 'The Jewish Family' at his own expense via a publisher in Germany. The Russian government censors viewed its promotion of Jewish life as reprehensible and did not allow its distribution in Russia until a abridged version was released in 1872.[25] In 1880, a collection of Mandelshtam's poems in German, "Voices in the Desert: Selected Jewish Songs," was published in London. Mandelshtam would also become the first writer to translate Pushkin to Hebrew.