MENAHEM MENDEL BEN ISAAC

MENAHEM MENDEL BEN ISAAC (second half of 16th century), tax collector, architect, and builder in Kazimierz, near cracow . Menahem Mendel was born in Brest-Litovsk, and from 1560 to 1568 was the king's tax farmer in the Zhmud (Zemaitkiemis) region of Lithuania. In 1572 he moved to Kazimierz, and by 1581 he had become one of the elders of the kahal. From the early 1570s, he constructed flour mills and city walls, and was noted as a designer and builder of bridges. During the Polish campaign against Russia (1579–82), King Stephen Báthory was accompanied by Menahem Mendel, who built bridges over the Dvina and military installations for the sieges of Polotsk, Velizh, and Pskov. In 1587, since he had supported the defeated Austrian archduke Maximilian, he was compelled to leave Poland. Upon his arrival in Vienna, he was given a modest allowance by the court. On July 4, 1589, he proposed that Emperor Rudolph II finance the building of a bridge over the Danube, between Vienna and Nussdorf, at an estimated outlay of 30,000 Rheingulden. Menahem Mendel was to levy tolls to repay the investment. After two years of deliberations the project was deferred indefinitely and Menahem Mendel returned to Kazimierz. In 1592 King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland deputed him to arrange a match between the king's aunt, Ann Jagellon, and an Austrian archduke. All trace of Menahem Mendel vanishes after this point. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: M. Balaban, in: Nowy Dziennik (Nov. 15, 1919); idem, Dzieje Żydów w Krakowie i na Kazimierzu, 1 (1931), 139, 159, 162; M. Bersohn, Dyplomataryusz dotycrący Żydów w dawnej Polsce (1910), 108 no. 171; Schwarz, in: Jahrbuch fuer Landeskunde von Niederoesterreich (1913), suppl. 1. (Arthur Cygielman)