Cecil Roth - Biography

Cecil Roth (London, 1899–1970), was a British Jewish historian.

He was educated at Merton College, Oxford (Ph.D., 1924) and returned to Oxford as reader in Jewish Studies from 1939 to 1964. Thereafter he was visiting professor at Bar-Ilan University, Israel (1964–1965), and at the City University of New York (1966–1969).

His brother, Leon (Haim Yehuda) Roth (1896–1963) was a philosopher, translator, author of several books, and served as Rector of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1940–43) and later Dean of Humanities (1949–51). He initiated a series of translation of philosophical classics into Hebrew, and established what later became Magnes Press.

Works

He was editor of Encyclopaedia Judaica from 1965 until his death.

His works number over 600 items, including:

• Life of Menasseh Ben Israel (Philadelphia, 1934);
• Roth Haggadah (1934)
• Magna Bibliotheca Anglo-Judaica: a Bibliographical Guide to Anglo-Jewish History (London, 1937);
• Anglo-Jewish Letters, 1158-1917 (London, 1938);
• History of the Great Synagogue (of London), available online, as part of the at the Susser Archive of JCR-UK;
• The Jewish Contribution to Civilization (New York 1941)
• History of the Jews in England (Oxford, 1941);
• History of the Jews in Italy (Philadelphia, 1946);
• History of the Marranos (Philadelphia, 1946);
• The Rise of Provincial Jewry (Oxford, 1950), available online, as part of the at the Susser Archive of JCR-UK.
• History of the Jews (initially published as A Bird's-Eye View of Jewish History) (1954);
• The Jews in the Renaissance (Philadelphia, 1959);
• Jewish Art (1961);
• The Dead Sea Scrolls (1965).