GALLICO, ELISHA BEN GABRIEL

GALLICO, ELISHA BEN GABRIEL (c. 1583), talmudic scholar and kabbalist in Safed. Gallico was a pupil of joseph caro and a member of the latter's bet din. After the death of Caro, he was a member of moses trani 's bet din. Gallico was the teacher of samuel uceda . Gallico's signature appears – once together with the other scholars of Safed – on several responsa (in Caro's Avkat Rokhel, etc.). After Caro's death, according to his instructions, Gallico banned azariah dei rossi 's Me'or Einayim. The collection of Gallico's responsa has been lost; however several of them are quoted both in the work Keneset ha-Gedolah and in the responsa Ba'ei Ḥayyei by Ḥayyim Benvenisti . Gallico wrote homiletic and kabbalistic commentaries on all the five scrolls. The commentaries on Ecclesiastes (Venice 1578), Esther (Venice 1583), and the Song of Songs (Venice 1587) have been published. Toward the end of his life he headed a yeshivah in Safed. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: L. Zunz, in: Kerem Ḥemed, 5 (1841), 141; Michael, Or, no. 474; D. Tamar, in: Sefunot, 7 (1963), 173; idem, in: KS, 33 (1958), 378. (David Tamar)