BASS Origin of surname
Surnames derive from one of many different origins. Sometimes there may be more than one explanation for the same name. Bas(s) is an acronym (a name created from the initial letters of a Hebrew phrase, and which refers to a relative, lineage or occupation) of the Hebrew Bnei Sofrim ("sons of the scribes"), but it is also a synonym for a Cantor or Hazan (or the Hebrew "Meshorer") with a deep (bass) voice. The German and Yiddish equivalent is Singer/Saenger. All these and similar terms have produced Jewish family names in several languages and spelling variants. One of the earliest documented forms is San(c)kmeister (from the German Singmeister, that is "song master"), recorded with Lezer Sankmeister in 1439 and Heinrich Sanckmeister in 1449. The Italian equivalent Cantarini was the name of a well-known 16th century Italian family. Cantori is mentioned in the 16th century, Isaak Ben Avigdor Bass of Cracow in Poland in 1600, and Singer in 1676. Cantor is documented as a Jewish family name in 1679, Senger in 1683, Bassista in the 17th century, Schulsinger in 1709, Sulsinger in 1724, Kanter in 1736, and Vorsinger in 1784. Slavic equivalents include Solovej (literally "nightingale") and Spivak. A Romanian form is Dascal(u), literally "sexton". Bohemian-born Sabbatai Bass was a 17th century Hebrew printer in the Netherlands and Germany.
Distinguished 20th century bearers of the Jewish family name Bass include the Lithuanian-born American Yiddish teacher and essayist Hyman B. Bass (Beprozvany), executive secretary of the congress for Jewish Culture and president of the Jewish Book Council of America; the Russian-born Hebrew poet and writer Samuel Bass, who was joint editor of the Tel Aviv bi-monthly 'Pesioth'; the Iranian-born Israeli engineer, educator and author, Lipa Bass; and the Polish-born Israeli architect and painter Yossef Bass (1908-1995), who published 11 books of political caricatures.
Dyhernfurth
(Place)Dyhernfurth
Polish: Brzeg Dolny
Town in lower Silesia, near Wroclaw (Breslau); from 1945 in Poland.
HISTORY
Its Jewish community dates from 1688, when Shabbetai Bass, founder of modern Hebrew bibliography, leased printing privileges from the local magnate who, in turn, held them from the emperor. The first work he printed in Dyhernfurth was Samuel B. Uri Shraga Phoebus' Beit Shemu'el, a commentary on Shulchan Arukh Even Ha-Ezer (1689). A community was formed by 13 families, all employed in Bass's printing works. Both Bass and his son Joseph had to contend with the hostility of the Jesuits, but printing continued until 1762, from 1717 under Berel Nathan, husband of Bass's granddaughter Esther, and later under Esther herself.
Other printing houses were established by Samuel B. Abraham Katz (until 1767), Abraham Lewin (until 1771), Solomon Koenigsberg (1774-75), M. L. May (until 1819), H. Warschauer Co., and lastly D. Sklower, whose press closed in 1834 when he moved to Breslau. The Dyhernfurth productions, which included a complete Talmud and Maimonides' Mishneh Torah, were very popular at the time, but business declined due to outside competition. A Yiddish newspaper, serving the Breslau community, was printed there in 1770.
The cemetery of Dyhernfurth was used by Breslau Jews until 1765; a Memorbuch was started before 1700. The synagogue, consecrated in 1847, was sold in 1926. The numbers of the community declined from 191 in 1833 to 42 in 1885, and five in 1910, and it was dissolved in 1916.