Reyna Nasi

Reyna Nasi was born in Portugal to Gracia Nasi, one of the wealthiest Jewish women of Renaissance Europe, and was taken to Antwerp at the age of five. At the age of twelve she had to flee to Italy, and finally settled with her mother in Istanbul, in 1553, where she married her first cousin, Joseph Nasi in 1554.

Joseph became highly influential at the court of Sultan Selim II (r. 1566 – 1574) and was named Duke of Naxos and the Cyclades in 1566. He was also granted a monopoly on the import of wines through the Bosporus, said to have brought him a net income of 15,000 ducats annually, and has obtained important trading privileges in Poland. After the death of her husband (Aug. 2, 1579), Reyna devoted her fortune of 90,000 ducats to the interests of Jewish learning. In her palace at Belvedere, near Istanbul, Reyna established and financed a printing press for the publication of Hebrew and other Jewish books. The press was established in 1592 and operated until 1594. The second press was established in 1597 at Kuru Chesme, a village near Constantinople on the European side of the Bosporus, and operated for two years.