Crescas Explained

Crescas (pronounced as /ca/, he|קרשקש) is a Judaeo-Catalan family name, prominent in the former Crown of Aragon. Crescas is a common name among Jews of southern France and Catalonia.^[1] There have been a number of scholars and rabbis sharing that surname, including:

• Abiathar Crescas, a 15th-century Jewish physician and astrologer, doctor to King John II of Aragon (1458–79)
• Astruc Don Crescas
• Meshullam ben Machir, Don Bonet Crescas de Lunel, French scholar who settled at Perpignan, where he died in 1306
• Hasdai Crescas (Barcelona – 1410/1411), a Catalan Jewish philosopher, halakhist
• Israel ben Joseph Halevi Crescas Caslari, known as "Crescas Caslari", an Aragonese-French Jewish physician and poet
• Mordecai En Crescas of Orange
• Don Crescas Vidal of Perpignan (fr)
• Vidal de Caslar Crescas

Cresques

Cresques (pronounced as /ca/) is the Catalan standardized variant of the Jewish name Crescas (he|קרשקש)

• Abraham Cresques (? – 1387), a Jewish cartographer from Palma de Mallorca
• Jehuda Cresques (also Jafudà Cresques; 1350 ? – 1427 ?)
• Cresques Abiatar, a Jewish physician in Catalan Aragon Kingdom

External links

• Cresques entry at Behind the Name

Notes and References

1. Book: Encyclopedia Judaica. Kester Publishing. 1972. Volume 5, pages 1075.