Naftali Herz Imber
Jewish poet, writer (1856–1909)
Naftali Herz Imber (Hebrew: נפתלי הרץ אימבר, Yiddish: נפתלי הערץ אימבער; December 27, 1856 – October 8, 1909) was a Jewish Hebrew-language poet, most notable for writing "Hatikvah", the poem that became the basis for the Israeli national anthem.
Biography
Naftali Herz Imber was born in Złoczów (now Zolochiv, Ukraine), a city in Galicia, which then was part of the Austrian Empire. His parents were Joshua Heschel Schorr and Hodel Imber, who followed a strictly Orthodox lifestyle. He began writing poetry at the age of 10 and several years later received an award from Emperor Franz Joseph for a poem on the centenary of Bukovina's joining to the Austrian Empire. His brother, Shmaryahu Imber, also became a writer and a local teacher, and his son, Naftali's nephew Shmuel Yankev, became a Yiddish language poet. In his youth Naftali Herz Imber traveled through Hungary, Serbia, and Romania.
In 1882 Imber moved to Ottoman Palestine as a secretary of Sir Laurence Oliphant. He lived with Oliphant and his wife Alice in their homes in Haifa and Daliyat al-Karmel. Oliphant sent him to Beirut to learn the art of watchmaking. Upon his return he helped Imber open a shop in Haifa.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q359717. VIAF identifies the subject as 816021. The Library of Congress control number is n80145983. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1856, 1909 and 1882.
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This entry incorporates text from “Naftali Herz Imber” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.