MAGGID-STEINSCHNEIDER, HILLEL NOAH

MAGGID-STEINSCHNEIDER, HILLEL NOAH (1829–1903), Hebrew scholar and writer. Maggid-Steinschneider, born in Vilna, owed the first part of his name to his grandfather Phinehas, who was Maggid in Vilna, and the second part to his profession, stonemasonry (Steinschneider). He also was a bookdealer. As a stonemason he often composed tombstone inscriptions, which led to an interest in and research about the lives of well-known Vilna families and personalities, particularly those buried in the old and new cemeteries of the town. He published Ir Vilna (part 1 only, 1900), a biographical work containing hundreds of biographies of famous Vilna personalities. Maggid also assisted S.J. *Fuenn in collecting material for his history of Vilna Jewry, Kiryah Ne'emanah (1860), and also prepared its second edition with numerous additions and a biography of the author (1915). He wrote a history of the *Guenzburg family completed by his son (Toledot Mishpeḥot Guenzburg, 1899) and a biography of David Oppenheim (in Y. ben Ḥayyim Mezah (ed.), Gan Peraḥim, 1882); with his father-in-law J. Gordon he composed a Thousand Year Calendar, Lu'aḥ al Elef Shanim (1854).

Maggid contributed numerous biographical and genealogical articles to Hebrew periodicals, such as Ha-Shaḥar, Ha-Karmel, and Ha-Maggid. He was put in charge of the *Straschun and S.J. Fuenn libraries when they were given to the Vilna community. Maggid's biographical and bibliographical research, much of which remained unpublished, was of importance, though like other works of the transitory period from old to modern scholarship, his writings lacked organization and literary form.

bibliography:

Kressel, Leksikon, 2 (1967), 314ff.; Rejzen, Leksikon, 2 (1927), 356ff.; H.N. Maggid, El ha-Kore (1900), 7–10, introd.; D. Maggid, in: Fun Noentn Over, 1 (1937), 3–12; Budushchnost, 4 (1903), 248–52.

[Yehuda Slutsky]