Geniza Lab

minute fragments from different, unrelated documents, containing letters and legal documents.

Right fragment: Note in Judaeo-Arabic. "I have sent with Rabbi Ahuv 10 Kāmilī dirhams..."

Left fragment: Magical text with the header ללמטלקה = for the divorcee

Right side fragment: Letter addressed to Shemuel b. Sīd. In Hebrew. Dating: Early 17th century. Needs examination for content. In the upper margin of recto, it refers to the death of Yosef and to his son Shelomo b. Yosef.

Left side fragment: Letter from Yaʿaqov b. Elyaqim, in Jerusalem, to the judge Shemuel b. Sīd, in Fustat/Cairo. In Hebrew and Ladino. Dating: Early 17th century. Reports on the order of prayers being conducted in Jerusalem (as acknowledgment of a financial contribution?): 3 psalms, 3 qinnot, a qaddish, seliḥot and another qaddish, 30 psalms and a qaddish. ("This is done because of the command and the will of Your Mercy. . .")

List of items of clothing with their prices. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Letter from Nissim b. Salāma to his father Salāma b. Nissim. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: 11th century. The writer reports on various financial matters, reports that everyone in his location is in good health, and conveys his preoccupation on behalf of his father, his grandfather, and his paternal aunt. He heard that all of them were "mutakassil," an obscure word referring to some type of illness—Goitein suggests fatigue. Information from Goitein's index cards. ASE.

Letter addressed to a Nagid (Avraham Maimuni or his son David), reporting about payments.

Letter (lower fragment) by Nahray b. Nissim containing instructions about merchandise and payments. Dated ca. 1055. (Information from Gil)

Letter written on behalf of a woman who complains that someone pawned an amount of one dinar. She asks her addressee to take from him what he owes her. At the top of document someone added in Judaeo-Arabic דכרת (the same word that begins the Arabic-script letter), and at the bottom is the Hebrew formula שלומו יגדל "may his peace increase," One of the people in the letter is named Hilāl b. Aharon Ibn al-Shammāʿ. (Information from Naïm Vanthieghem and Oded Zinger)

Letter, calligraphic, written in alternating Hebrew and Arabic. Dealing with political machinations and silencing enemies. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.)

Deathbed declaration in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe ha-Levi (Date: 1100-1138). Concerning Abū l-Ḥusayn Moshe b. Shelomo al-ʿAṭṭār (ZL), who had given his wife of second marriage, in addition to her deferred marriage gift of 50 dinars, an additional gift of ten dinars. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 3:251, 411, 481; 5:140, 544) EMS

Draft of a deathbed declaration in which Abu al-Husayn Moshe b. Shelomo, the perfume vendor, grants his wife her delayed marriage gift and stipulates conditions in case she remarries. Dated ca. 1120. The document begins on verso, which also contains its main part, and continues on recto in the form of a draft written in a different hand. See also ENA 1822a.17, which contains the same document. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, pp. 411, 168, 251, 463, 481)

Legal document(s)
s s
the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe (Date: 1100–38 CE). The main text (not in the margins) on both sides may just be formulary. No names seem to be mentioned, and there are many elaborate formulae of release. The marginal text was written with a different pen, one with a smaller tip. Recto: refers to the Gaon (Maṣliaḥ), Naḥman, someone suing his late paternal uncle, and another paternal uncle Yosef ha-Kohen. Verso: Refers to the Gaon Maṣliaḥ (1127–39 CE); a woman making someone take an oath; "the court has no connection to this case, and your paternal uncle until now has been responding to..."; more about an oath and repaying something; it being discovered that someone had no right to anything belonging to his or her paternal uncle's; and then a brief narrative of someone abasing(?) themselves by putting their head between someone's arms and/or legs and begging for forgiveness; but the paternal uncle was ashamed to ask those present to do something. Very cryptic—needs further examination.

Letter addressed to Sitt al-Khayr. It seems that the writer had learned that Sitt al-Khayr's daughter was going to get married and expresses her expectation in the letter to receive an invitation. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Letter from Umm Abū ʿAlī, in the Rif, likely near Damīra, to her son Isḥāq, in Fustat. The latter may live with his aunt and uncle, as the letter is addressed to the writer's sister’s son, Abū l-Munā. The writer is ill, and she repeatedly tells Isḥāq to tell Umm Abū l-Munā to send myrobalan and a medicinal syrup back with the messenger, presumably to be furnished by Abu l-Muna’s father who is a maker of syrups (sharābī). Isḥāq's wife seems to be pregnant (the writer is waiting for "khalāṣ zawjatak"). The writer invites her sister Umm Abū l-Munā to visit her in the village by promising plenty of watermelons to eat. This letter is mentioned in Mediterranean Society, I, p. 121. The Arabic address reads: "yaṣil hādhā l-kitāb ilā waladī al-shaykh Abū l-Munā b. Abū Surrī al-sharābī min khālatihi Umm Abū ʿAlī ... dār al-wāzīr (or wāzīn?)." ASE.

Halakhic discussion or responsum concerning a mercantile partnership, citing a barayta. Probably not a partnership contract (as previously catalogued).

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment (last 6 lines). Names: Mūsā Ibn al-Sofer; Yosef Ibn al-ʿŪdī; Abū l-Surūr; Yiṣḥaq. Then a warning: "beware of delay..." (the same warning appears in official letters from some of the later Maimonidean Nagids, which would be consistent with the handwriting of this letter).

Letter addressed to Khalaf b. Seʿadya. Formal letter with wide space between the lines. Only the Hebrew introduction is preserved.

Letter about betrothal of minor girls from David b. Daniel.