The documentary Books: Alantansí’s Legacy, directed by the Aragonese filmmaker José Ángel Guimerá, restores the forgotten figure of Eliezer ben Abraham Alantansí, a pioneer of Hebrew printing in the Iberian Peninsula. Born in Huesca in the mid-15th century, he later moved to the town of Ixar (today Híjar, Teruel), where in 1482 he founded a printing workshop that became a milestone in the cultural history of Sepharad. There he produced foundational works of Sephardic Judaism, such as the Tur Orah Hayim and the Hebrew Bible with the Five Megillot—true incunabula now preserved in major libraries in Madrid, Jerusalem, Oxford, New York, and Turin.

The film traces the career of this erudite with entrepreneurial spirit, who worked under the protection of the first Duke of Híjar. His books, of exceptional typographic and aesthetic quality, attest to the refinement of a printer ahead of his time. The narrative blends docu-fiction scenes recreating his native Huesca, the synagogue, the workshop, and the Híjar printing press, with the research journey of historian Lucía Conte, who has tracked surviving copies in universities and archives worldwide. Filming locations include the old synagogue of Híjar—the only one in Spain that retains medieval painted decoration—the Four Sephardic Synagogues of Jerusalem, the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, and the Bodleian Library in Oxford.

On September 18, the documentary will be screened in Barcelona at the Archive of the Crown of Aragon, located in the historic Palau del Lloctinent. This singular Gothic building, dating from the 16th century and once the residence of the Viceroy, houses one of the most important archival collections in Europe. The event, organized by the Ministry of Culture and the Archive, will highlight the deep historical ties between Jewish heritage and the broader cultural legacy preserved in this emblematic institution.

The Barcelona screening is part of the special tour of Books: Alantansí’s Legacy during the European Week of Jewish Culture, which also includes Casa Sefarad (Madrid), the Synagogue of El Tránsito (Toledo), Cinema Truffaut (Girona), the Provincial Council of Huesca, and the Auditorium of the University of Zaragoza. A journey that invites audiences to rediscover, from Aragon to the world, the universal legacy of a Sephardic printer born in Huesca and established in Híjar.

After the screening, there will be a panel discussion with José Ángel Guimerá, the film’s director; Asunción Blasco, Professor at the University of Zaragoza and leading expert on the figure of the printer; and Dr. Javier Castaño, Senior Research Scientist in Jewish History at Spain’s National Research Council (CSIC) in Madrid, whose work focuses on medieval Iberian Jewry and socio-religious studies.