Gershom ben Solomon Kohen

[2] Kohen and Eva had five sons: Solomon, Mordecai, Moses, Judah, and Benjamin.

Kohen was one of the rare individuals to receive a geleitbrief, a letter of safe conduct, to give them more time to arrange their affairs to leave Bohemia.

[4] After 1512[10] or in 1514,[9] Kohen joined a consortium in Prague with the objective of printing Hebrew books and became its leading member.

[5][9][e] Kohen used ornaments in his printed works, such as birds, lions, angels, and municipal coat of arms.

Woodblocks were commissioned to print incipits, borders, illustrations, and emblems of local towns.

[2] Kohen's eldest sons print the Mahzor Helek ha-Sheni in 1529, with large square type and with black and white woodblock illustrations, because the illuminated manuscripts were expensive to produce and too costly for their buyers, which had become a trend by 1529, enabling more lay people to own books.

[3] Kohen was the founder of a long line of printers into the late 1700s, the Gersonides or Gersonites.

[10][2][3] His descendants, such as his son Mordecai,[13] continued to follow the Prague tradition for printing, with rare and occasional touches influenced by Italy.

[4] The printers initially called themselves the Gershon family ("mishpahat ha-Gershuni"), sometimes clarifying that they descended from Gershom ben Solomon Kohen.

[2] The Proops family of Amsterdam produced books with a priestly blessing device, as did their Kohen ancestor had beginning in 1514.