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{{Short description|Indian Navy personnel and song translator (1912–2002)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2017}}
{{Use Indian English|date=June 2017}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Ruby "Rivka" Daniel
| image =
| imagesize =
| caption =
| native_name = רובי "רבקה" דניאל
| birth_name = Ruby Daniel
| birth_date = December 1912
| birth_place = [[Cochin]], [[Kingdom of Cochin]], [[British Raj|British India]]
| death_date = 23 September 2002
| death_place = [[Neot Mordekhai]], [[Israel]]
| restingplacecoordinates =
| native_name_lang = he
| othername =
| occupation = {{hlist|[[Indian Navy]]|writer|translator}}
| yearsactive =
| spouse =
| partner =
| children =
| parents = Eliyahu Hai Daniel (d. 1934) and Leah Japheth Daniel (1892–1982)
| website =
| awards =
}}
'''Ruby''' "'''Rivka'''" '''Daniel''' ({{Langx|he|רובי "רבקה" דניאל}}; December 1912 – 23 September 2002) was a [[Malayali]] of [[Cochin Jew]]ish heritage, the first Malayali woman in the [[Indian Navy]], and the first Cochin Jewish woman to publish a book. Between the years of 1982–1999 Daniel translated into English over 120 [[Judeo-Malayalam]] women's songs. Her translation efforts led the way for an ongoing international project to translate and analyze the songs within the Cochin Jewish community.<ref name=":0">{{cite web|url=http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/daniel-ruby |title=Ruby Daniel |work=Jewish Women's Archive |accessdate=12 October 2013}}</ref>

== Early life ==
Ruby Daniel was born in [[Kochi, India]] and was the eldest child of Eliyahu Hai Daniel and Leah Japheth Daniel. Her father, Eliyahu Hai Daniel, sold tickets for the ferry boat which connected Cochin with [[Ernakulam]]. Ruby had two younger siblings – Bingley and Rahel. Ruby also lived with her maternal grandparents, Eliyahu and Rivka ("Docho") Japheth.

Ruby Daniel excelled in school, both at the local government school for girls and at the Jewish school where she studied Hebrew, Torah, and the synagogue liturgy every morning and afternoon. She attended [[St. Treasas Convent Girls Higher Secondary School]] in Ernakulam. She completed high school there and studied one year at [[St. Teresa's College]]. She left St. Teresa's College after her father and grandfather died in the same year.<ref name=":0" />

== Military career ==
Ruby Daniel enlisted in the military and served in the Armed Forces of India. She is noted for not only being one of the few women in the Indian army at the time but also as the first Jewish Indian woman and the first Malayali to do so in modern Indian history. She was employed for over fifteen years in government service, as a clerk in the High Court, District Court Munsiff Court, and from 1944 to 1946 in the Women's [[Royal Indian Navy]].<ref name=":0" />

== Writing career ==
She made [[aliyah]] in 1951 and moved to the predominantly [[Ashkenazi Jews|Ashkenazi]] and secular [[kibbutz]] [[Neot Mordechai]].<ref>[http://thejewishchronicle.net/view/full_story/27119483/article--Ruby-of-Cochin--provides-firsthand-look-at-bygone-era-of-India-s-Jews?instance=news_style ‘Ruby of Cochin’ provides firsthand look at bygone era of India’s Jews] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160829035724/http://thejewishchronicle.net/view/full_story/27119483/article--Ruby-of-Cochin--provides-firsthand-look-at-bygone-era-of-India-s-Jews?instance=news_style |date=29 August 2016 }}. [[The Jewish Chronicle]]</ref> Her 1995 memoir, "Ruby of Cochin", lists a fourth method for marriage among the Jews of Cochin: that of witness by the entire congregation to a marriage. The memoir includes her experience in the Armed Forces of India as a Jewish woman among Hindu and Muslim men. In order to preserve Cochin Jewish culture, Ruby Daniel published a booklet of nine songs in Judeo-Malayalam – transliterated in Hebrew. She worked prodigiously through the 1990s to translated some 130 songs, which are sung by the Jewish women,<ref>{{Cite web |last=Bose |first=Abhish K. |date=2016-06-07 |title=Jewish folk songs similar to those of Kerala |url=https://www.deccanchronicle.com/entertainment/music/070616/jewish-folk-songs-similar-to-those-of-kerala.html |access-date=2022-11-06 |website=Deccan Chronicle |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Chemana |first=Martine |date=2002-10-15 |title=Women sing, men listen |url=https://journals.openedition.org/bcrfj/942 |journal=Bulletin du Centre de recherche français à Jérusalem |language=en |issue=11 |pages=83–98 |issn=2075-5287}}</ref> into English.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/daniel-ruby |title=The Journal of Asian Studies |work=Jewish Women's Archive |accessdate=12 October 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|url=http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=6802256 |title=Ruby Daniel |journal= The Journal of Asian Studies|date=August 1997 |volume=56 |issue=3 |pages=811–812 |doi=10.2307/2659650 |jstor=2659650 |accessdate=12 October 2013|last1=Gentes |first1=M. J. |s2cid=161154172 |url-access=subscription }}</ref>

=== Works ===
* ''We Learned from the Grandparents: Memories of a Cochin Jewish Woman''. 1992
* ''Ruby of Cochin'' .Jewish Publication Society (JPS). 1995

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

{{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Daniel, Ruby}}
[[Category:1912 births]]
[[Category:2002 deaths]]
[[Category:Cochin Jews]]
[[Category:Malayalam-language writers]]
[[Category:Writers from Kochi]]
[[Category:Indian women in war]]
[[Category:Indian emigrants to Israel]]
[[Category:Israeli people of Indian-Jewish descent]]
[[Category:Women in war 1900–1945]]
[[Category:Military personnel from Kerala]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian translators]]
[[Category:Malayali people]]
[[Category:Women writers from Kerala]]
[[Category:Jewish women writers]]
[[Category:Indian women in World War II]]
[[Category:Indian military personnel of World War II]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian women writers]]
[[Category:Women from the Kingdom of Cochin]]
[[Category:People from the Kingdom of Cochin]]
[[Category:Indian women non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:Israeli women biographers]]
[[Category:Indian women biographers]]
[[Category:20th-century Indian biographers]]
[[Category:English-language writers from India]]
[[Category:Jewish translators]]

Ruby Daniel - Revision history

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