1. Rabbenu Ya'akob b. Meir b. Shemuel was, on his mother’s side, a grandson of Rashi (q.vf. He was his parents’ third son, younger brother of Ribam and Rashbam (q.vi), older brother of Rabbenu Shelomoh of Rameru, and brother-in-law of Rabbenu Shemuel b. Simhah of Vitry the younger (the reputed author of the Mahzor Vitry, i now apparently lost). Rabbenu Tham had, like his grandfather Rashi, six teachers (1) his own father, (2) his brother Ribam, (3) his brother Rashbam, (4) Rabbenu Ya'akob b. Shimshon, (5) his grandfather Rashi, and (6) Rabbenu Yoseph Tob-'Elem the younger. Rabbenu Tham had at least five children. The names of three of his sons were Yoseph, Yishak, and Shelomoh. Rabbenu Tham was unquestionably among Jews the foremost man of his age. For not only was he the greatest Talmudist after his maternal grandfather’s death, but he also added reading wide and varied to a stupendous memory and a marvellous power of combination, such as appeared only again in the last century in the persons of R. Yehonathan Eybenschiitz (06. 1764) and R. Yehezkel Landau (ob. 1793). Let us add that he was a lexicographer, grammarian, and Biblical commentator of no mean order; that he was a poet in Hebrew and Aramaic inferior only to Ibn Gebirol (Avicebron, q.v.), Mosheh Ibn 'Ezra, and Yehudah Hallevi (and by far greater in this art than the commentator Abraham Ibn 'Ezra); that he was held in high esteem by prince and nobles; and that he was a man of great wealth, with which he generously supported, not merely his own poorer hearers, but other itinerant scholars also.

His works are the following :—

(1) Commentary on Job, and, no doubt, on other parts of the Bible (see Camb. Univ. Lib. MS. Dd. 8. 53, leaves 15, 4a, lla, 12b). All these are apparently now lost. (2) Hakhrdoth, i.e., lexical and grammatical decisions between Menahem Ibn Seruk and Dunash b. Labrat (see Sepher Teshuboth I) unash b. Labrat, Edinburgh, 1885, 8vo). That these “decisions” are really by Rabbenu Tham is proved by the before-named MS., leaves 10α and 16α, where the book is quoted by an author of the 13th century. (3) Sepher Hayyashar (Vienna, 1810, folio). Although this work, in its present form, is the compilation of one of Rabbenu Tham’s disciples, R. Yishak b. Durbal by name (also called Isaac of Russia; see Schiller-Szinessy, Catalogue, i. p. 164, and ii. p. 66), not only is the foundation Rabbenu Tham’s (see Preface), but the contents also are virtually his. Compare the Cambridge MS. Add. 667. 1, passim. (4) The greater part of the Tosaphoth in the Babylonian Talmud are indirectly also by Rabbenu Tham; and he is virtually the first Tosaphist. It is true that his father, his brother Rashbam (q.v.), and his uncle Rabbenu Yehudah b. Nathan had written Tosaphoth before him, and that this kind of literary activity lasted to within the first quarter of the 14th century. Still, most and the best of the Tosaphoth now in our hands rest on Rabbenu Tham and his school. (5) Mahzor, i.e., a prayer-book, &c., for the whole year, with Rabbinic ordinances, &c. See Tosaphoth on T. B., Berakhoth, leaf 37α, catchword DD12Π, and Birekhoth Maharam of R. Meir b. Barukh of Rothenburg (Riva di Trento, 1558, 8vo), leaf 4α. (6) Poems. These are partly didactic and partly liturgical. Of the former kind a specimen will be found (“On the Accents,” communicated by Halberstam) in Kobak’s Yeshurun, v. p. 125 sq. The liturgical poems, again, are of two kinds: (a) such as have no metre and rhyme only by means of plurals, possessive pronouns, and such like (rhymed prose), and which perfectly resemble most of the productions of the Franco-Ashkenazic school (see, for example, the facsimile in Muller’s Catalogue, Amsterdam, 1868, 8vo); {b) such as have metre and rhyme, and resemble the productions of the Sepharadic school, e.g., the one beginning TVD "p " n (and not ΊΠ; see MS. Add. 667, leaf 102α). (7) Various ordinances, &c., are to be found in later writers (see AIS. Add. 667, in Cambridge, passim, and Teshuboth Maharam, Prague, 1608, folio, § 1023, he.). Rabbenu Tham died in 1171; see Rashi’s Siddur, ii. (formerly Luzzatto’s, then Halberstam’s, and now the property of the master of St John’s College, Cambridge), leaf 48α.

2. Rabbenu Ya'akob of Orleans, rabbi of London (?). He is often quoted in the Tosaphoth (both on the Pentateuch and on the Babylonian Talmud). No independent works of his, however, are extant. He was killed at London in the tumult on the coronation day of Richard Coeur-de-Lion (September 3,1189; Schiller-Szinessy, Catal., i. p. 117). (s. Μ. s.-s.)

The climate is continental, and, although the average temperature at Tamboff is 42° F., the winter is comparatively cold (January, 13°; July, 68°). The rivers remain frozen for four months and a half. Forests occupy less than one-sixth of the total area, and occur chiefly in the west; in the south-east wood is scarce, and straw is resorted to for fuel. The soil is fertile throughout; in the north, indeed, it is clayey and sometimes sandy, but the rest of the government is covered with a sheet, 2 to 3 feet in thickness, of the most fertile tchernozem, of such richness, indeed, that in Borisoglyebsk corn-fields which have not been manured for eighty years still yield good crops.

Tamboff is one of the densely peopled provinces of Russia. Its population in 1883 reached 2,519,660, and in several districts (Kozloff, Lebedyan, Lipetsk) there are from 110 to 130 inhabitants per square mile. It is Great Russian in the central portion, but has a notable admixture of Mordvinians {q.v.) and Mescheriaks in the west and north-west, as also of Tartars: the Mordvinians (who are rapidly becoming Russified) constitute 4 per cent, of the aggregate population of Tamboff; the Tartars number about 20,000, and the Mescheriaks about 4000. Nonconformity is widely spread, although the official figures disclose only 14,300 Raskolniks. Notwithstanding a high birth-rate (45 in the thousand), the annual increase of population is but slow (0’5 per cent, annually).

The prevailing occupation is agriculture, and in 1883 only 168,200 persons had their residence in towns, which are mostly themselves nothing but large villages of agriculturists living together, with a few merchants. More than two-thirds of the area is arable, and of this proportion 53 per cent, belongs to peasant communities, 36 per cent, to private individuals, and 11 per cent, to the crown. The crops of the years 1883 to 1885 yielded on the average 8,885,000 quarters of grain (half being rye, and one-third oats). Corn is exported to a considerable extent from the south, although it is deficient in the north. Hemp and. linseed are also cultivated for exportation. The cultivation of tobacco is yearly increasing: 5220 acres were under this crop in 1885, and yielded nearly 50,000 cwts. In the same year 15,950 acres were under beetroot, and yielded 1,660,000 cwts. Cattle-breeding, though less extensively carried on than formerly, is still important (656,300 horses, 399,500 horned cattle, and 1,326,600 sheep in 1883). Excellent breeds of horses are met with, not only on the larger estates, but also in the hands of the wealthier peasants, those of the Bityug river being most esteemed. Manufactures are represented chiefly by distilleries, tallow-melting Λvorks, sugar-works, and a few woollencloth mills. The petty trades are not very extensively carried on in the villages. Commerce is very brisk, owing to the large amounts of corn exported,—Kozloff, Morshansk, Tamboff, and Borisoglyebsk being the chief centres for this traffic, and Lebedyan for the trade in horses and cattle. Tamboff is rather backward educationally: in 1883 there were only 629 schools, attended by 34,739 boys and 5680 girls. The government is divided into twelve districts, the chief towns of which, with their populations in 1884, are Tamboff (34,000 inhabitants), Borisoglyebsk (13,000), Elatma (7560), Kirsanoff (7770), Kozloff (27,900), Lebedyan (6250), Lipetsk (15,860), Morshansk (21,200), Shatsk (7260), Spassk (5010), Temnikoff (13,700), and Usman (8110 in 1880). A distinctive feature of Tamboff is its very large villages of crown-peasants, a dozen of which have from 5000 to 7000 inhabitants each. Several of them—like Raskazovo (a great centre of Nonconformity), Atabukhi, Sasovo, Izberdei, and Arkhangelskoye—are important commercial centres.

The region now included in the north of the government was settled by Russians during the earliest centuries of the principality of Moscow, but until the end of the 17 th century the fertile tracts to the south remained too insecure for settlers. In the following century a few immigrants began to come in from the steppe, and landowners who had received large grants of land as gifts of the czars began to bring their serfs from central Russia. The population has very rapidly increased within the present century.

TAMBOFF, capital of the above government, 300 miles distant from Moscow, is situated on the Tsna river, and on the railway from Kozloff to Saratoff. It is almost entirely built of wood, with broad unpaved streets, lined with low houses surrounded by gardens. It has a small public library, a theatre, and the few educational institutions which are usual in the chief towns of Russian provinces. Its manufactures are insignificant; and its trade, in local grain and in cattle purchased in the south and sent to Moscow, is far less important than that of Morshansk or Kozloff. The population in 1884 was 34,000.