Shemariah ben Elhanan was head of the yeshivah of Cairo, Egypt, about the end of the 10th century. Abraham ibn Daud

Abraham ibn Daud

Abraham ibn Daud was a Spanish-Jewish astronomer, historian, and philosopher; born at Toledo, Spain about 1110; died, according to common report, a martyr about 1180. He is sometimes known by the abbreviation Rabad I or Ravad I. His mother belonged to a family famed for its learning...

 (Sefer ha-Ḳabbalah, in A. Neubauer, M. J. C. i. 68) relates that Ibn Rumaḥis (or Ibn Demahin), an Arab

Arab

Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...

 admiral, had captured four scholars who were voyaging from Bari

Bari

Bari is the capital city of the province of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, in Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy after Naples, and is well known as a port and university city, as well as the city of Saint Nicholas...

 to Sebaste

Sebaste

Sebaste was a common placename in classical Antiquity. Sebaste was the Greek equivalent of the Latin Augusta. Ancient towns by the name sought to honor Augustus or a later Roman emperor.- Places :* Elaiussa Sebaste in Mersin Province, Turkey...

 to collect money for the maintenance of the great school in Babylonia

Babylonia

Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia , with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as a major power when Hammurabi Babylonia was an ancient cultural region in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia emerged as...

 ("haknasat kallah"), and that one of the four was called Shemariah b. Elhanan. Shemariah was sold by his captor at Alexandria

Alexandria

Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...

, where he was afterward ransomed by rich Jews.

Shemariah then went to Cairo, where he founded a flourishing school. As to the native place of the captured scholars, the general opinion, more particularly with regard to Shemariah, is that the four were Babylonians, I.H. Weiss (Dor, iv. 265, note 2) being the only authority who assigns them to Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. David Kaufmann

David Kaufmann

David Kaufmann was a Jewish-Austrian scholar born at Kojetín, Moravia...

 (in Berliner's Magazin, v. 70-75) thinks they came from Pumbedita

Pumbedita

Pumbedita was the name of a city in ancient Babylonia close to the modern-day city of Fallujah....

. This opinion, at least with regard to Shemariah b. Elhanan, is confirmed by a fragment of a responsum (published by A. Neubauer in J. Q. R. vi. 222-223) apparently addressed by Sherira Gaon

Sherira Gaon

Rav Sherira Gaon was the head of the Academy of Pumbeditha. He was one of the most prominent Geonim of his period, and the father of Hai Gaon, who succeeded him as gaon.Sherira was born in 906 and died in 1006. Rav Sherira Gaon (Hebrew: רב שרירא גאון or R. Sherira ben Ḥanina Gaon, Hebrew: רב...

 to Jacob ben Nissim

Jacob ben Nissim

Jacob ben Nissim ibn Shahin was a Jewish philosopher who lived at Kairouan, Tunisia in the 10th century; he was a younger contemporary of Saadia. At Jacob's request Sherira Gaon wrote a treatise entitled Iggeret, on the redaction of the Mishnah...

 at Kairwan (see Halberstam, ib. p. 596), in which Shemariah is spoken of as the head of the yeshibah of Nehardea

Nehardea

Nehardea or Nehardeah was a city of Babylonia, situated at or near the junction of the Euphrates with the Nahr Malka , one of the earliest centers of Babylonian Judaism. As the seat of the exilarch it traced its origin back to King Jehoiachin...

 and as a high authority in rabbinics.

Later, also, when Shemariah was the head of the yeshibah of Cairo

Cairo

Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...

, he was consulted by many rabbis from distant countries, and S. Schechter has published (in J. Q. R. x. 644-648) a long letter addressed to Shemariah by Ḥushiel of Kairwan, who, according to Abraham ibn Daud (l.c.), was captured with Shemariah, and another letter, by an unknown rabbi, also addressed to Shemariah (J. Q. R. xiv. 492-497).

----
Jewish Encyclopedia bibliography: Besides the sources mentioned, Grätz, Gesch. v., note 21, ii.; Harkavy, Teshubot ha-Ge'onim, p. 2.