Isaac Aboab da Fonseca
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Isaac Aboab da Fonseca was a rabbi, scholar, kabbalist, and religious writer. In 1656, he was one of several elders within the Portuguese-Jewish community in Amsterdam and for a time in Dutch Brazil before the Portuguese reconquest. He was one of the religious leaders who excommunicated philosopher Baruch Spinoza in 1656.
Portrait of Rabbi Isaac Aboab da Fonseca. This work is a translation of the Pentateuch into Spanish, with a commentary by Rabbi Fonseca. It was prepared for Jews in Dutch Brazil, who because of their Iberian heritage would be able to read Portuguese.
Dutch Brazil
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Dutch Brazil, also known as New Holland, was a colony of the Dutch Republic in the northeastern portion of modern-day Brazil, controlled from 1630 to 1654 during Dutch colonization of the Americas. The main cities of the colony were the capital Mauritsstad, Frederikstadt, Nieuw Amsterdam (Natal), Saint Louis, São Cristóvão, Fort Schoonenborch (Fortaleza), Sirinhaém, and Olinda.
Dutch siege of Olinda and Recife
Maurice of Nassau became known as "The Brazilian" after returning to the Netherlands
Title page of Historia Naturalis Brasiliae (1648)
African woman in Brazil, by Albert Eckhout