The mezuzah is placed¹ on the right-hand side of the entrance from the street into the lodge, and [on the right-hand side of] the exit from the courtyard into the lodge.²

footnotes: ¹ lit. ‘written’. ² It refers to where the lodge is in front of a courtyard and has two doorways, one facing the street and the other facing the courtyard.

If a garden has a doorpost where it adjoins the courtyard, the mezuzah is placed [on the right-hand side of] the exit from the garden into the courtyard; and if a lodge is attached to it,³ mezuzoth are to be placed on both doorways [of the lodge].

footnotes: ³ Between the garden and the courtyard, with doorways leading to each of them.

Where small rooms open into a reception room,⁴ the mezuzah is placed on that doorway which is customarily used.⁵ If they are all customarily used, mezuzoth are placed on all the doorways.

footnotes: ⁴ Access to which is gained only through the small ones. ⁵ So according to H. V’s reading is corrupt.

If a number of rooms have doorways leading from one room to the other,⁶ mezuzoth are placed at the entrance of each one of them. R. Judah says: If the ladder is movable on the four sides….⁷ is placed at every side’; but this also does not convey much sense.

footnotes: ⁶ lit. ‘rooms within one another’. ⁷ The sentence is obviously incomplete. H reads: ‘If the ladder is movable a mezuzah

If a doorway leads from a roof [into a room], the mezuzah is placed [on the right-hand side of] the entrance from the roof. R. Nathan b. R. Jose said: In such a case Beth Shammai hold that the doorway is subject to mezuzah and Beth Hillel hold that it is exempt.

In a booth that is set back⁸ from [the edge of] a roof the mezuzah is to be placed [on the right-hand side of] the exit from the booth to the roof. R. Jose says: [On the right-hand side of the entrance] from the roof to the booth.

footnotes: ⁸ lit. ‘within’.

In the case of a portico that is set back from the rooms and has no other exit,⁹ the mezuzah is placed [on the right-hand side of] the exit from the portico into the rooms. R. Jose says: [On the right-hand side of] the entrance from the rooms to the portico.

footnotes: ⁹ Except through one of the rooms.

If an entrance serves as two doorways and a wall [of not more than] one handbreath in width [separates them], only one mezuzah is to be affixed, according to R. Judah. [If the wall was] wider than that two mezuzoth are required.

The mezuzah is placed in the upper half of the doorpost;¹⁰ so R. Meir. R. Judah says: [It should be placed] below the handbreadth [from the top of the doorpost] and above one handbreadth [from the bottom].

footnotes: ¹⁰ lit. ‘from the half and above’. Another reading is: ‘on the upper third’; cf. the ruling in the name of Samuel in Men. 33a (Sonc. ed., p. 208).

If one made a groove in the wall at a distance of [not more than] one handbreadth [from the doorpost], and placed [the mezuzah] in it, the mezuzah is valid. [If the distance] was greater than that it is invalid. If one made a groove in a stick and put the mezuzah in it, it is invalid. If one inserted [the mezuzah] in a tube and hung it up behind the door [or] behind the doorpost,¹¹ R. Meir declared it valid, but R. Judah declared it invalid.

footnotes: ¹¹ Hanging the stick on the doorpost.

A new house is subject to the obligation of mezuzah as soon as it is completed.

One who lodges in an inn in the Land of Israel for thirty days is subject to the obligation of mezuzah, and if one rents [a house] he must affix [a mezuzah] forthwith. Outside the Land of Israel, [one who lives in an inn] is exempt, and one who rents [a house] must affix [a mezuzah] after thirty days.

[A Jew] who rents a house from a Gentile or from a Samaritan must affix a mezuzah forthwith, and when he quits he must remove it; but if one rents a house from an Israelite, he affixes the mezuzah forthwith and when he quits he must not remove it.

One who buys a house from a Gentile or a Samaritan is under the obligation of putting a mezuzah, but [if he bought it] from an Israelite it is presumed [to have been provided with the necessary mezuzoth].

If one buys a brick-mould from a Gentile, he should not heat it before he had examined it. [The scroll in] the mezuzah should be examined once in twenty-five years, according to R. Simeon. R. Jacob says: A much longer time [may be allowed to intervene]. Both, however, agree that if it was transferred from one place to another it requires examination. In like manner, water-tanks¹², ‘stores’. in a public domain must be examined once in seven years, but those situated in a private domain once in twenty-five years, according to R. Meir; but the Sages say: In either case the general rule is that wherever there is a top cover¹³ instead of V’s bath. the examination takes place once in seven years, and where there is no top cover the examination takes place once in twenty-five years.

footnotes: ¹² lit. ‘machines’. H has mogeroth ¹³ Reading with H beth