BONDI

BONDI (Bondy, Bonte, Ponidi , באנדי, בונדי), family name, a translation of the Hebrew "Yom Tov" (in Romance languages bon – "good", dí – "day"). A Bondia family was known in Aragon in the 13^th century. In 1573 an Abraham Bondi lived in Ferrara. Adam Raphael b. Abraham Jacob Bondi and Ḥananiah Mazzal Tov b. Isaac Ḥayyim Bondi were rabbis and physicians in Leghorn in the second half of the 18^th century, when the family was also represented in Rome. In about 1600 the family appears in Prague; the first known member was Yom Tov b. Abraham Bondi; subsequently Eliezer, Mordecai, Meshullam (d. 1676), and his son Solomon Zalman Bondi (d. 1732) are mentioned as communal functionaries and scholars. Abraham b. Yom-Tov Bondi (d. 1786) was the author of Zera Avraham on the Even ha-Ezer, which his son Nehemiah Feivel (1762–1831) published in Prague in 1808 with his own additions. Nehemiah published his own Torat Neḥemyah on the Talmud tractate Bava Meẓia. Elijah b. Selig Bondi (1777–1860) was a rabbi and preacher in Prague. Although he was strictly conservative, the influence of the *Haskalah is discernible in his sermons (Sefer ha-She'arim (1832) and Tiferet ha-Adam (1856), both published in Prague). He also published Solomon *Luria's Yam shel Shelomo on tractate Gittin (1812). Simeon b. Isaac Bondi (c. 1710–1775) moved to Dresden in 1745 and became *Court Jew of the elector of Saxony and head of the Dresden community. Samuel Bondy (1794–1877) was among the founders of the Orthodox congregation in Mainz; his son Jonah (1816–1896) was rabbi there. Members of the family went to the U.S. Among them were August *Bondi and Jonas *Bondi.

bibliography:

R.J. Aumann, The Family Bondi (1966; includes genealogies and bibliography); Jakobowits, in: mgwj, 76 (1932), 511–9.

[Meir Lamed]