Aquino, Philip of

Aquino, Philip Of a learned rabbin, whose real name was Mardochai. He was born at Carpentras; but, on his expressing a desire to embrace Christianity, he found it necessary to leave France, and went to Naples, and was baptized at Aquino, whence his name. He died at Paris in 1650, where he had been made royal professor of Hebrew at the College de France. He assisted Le Jay in his Polyglot, and published Dictionarium Heb. Chald. Talm. Rabbinicum (Paris, 1629, fol.); Radices Lingua, Sanctae (Paris, 1620, 16mo); Rabbinical Comm. on the Pentateuch and Psalms (Latin; Paris, 1620, 4to); with other works of less importance, and several still in MS., among them a version of the N.T. in Hebrew, with notes. His son Louis translated into Latin the Comm. of Levi Ben Gerson on Job and Esther (Par. 1622, 4to). — Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Generale, 2, 946.