bally's grandfather, isaac, inherited the privileges of his father, and became the intimate counselor of many of the phanariot princes: he was especially favored by mavrogheni, whom he aided to mount the throne. his father, abraham, studied at leipzig, then established himself as wholesale merchant in bucharest, and exercised considerable influence with the boyars. when davicion bally was twelve years old his father died, and it seemed as if the son would have to terminate his studies at that age, for the father's partner defrauded the family out of almost all their possessions; but, thanks to an excellent library which the elder bally left davicion, he familiarized himself with the romanian, greek, french, italian, and german languages, in addition to spanish, which he had learned in his father's house. he also made considerable progress in the study of hebrew.