Geniza Lab

Letter from Alexandria to a merchant in Fustat. Around 1065. The letter contains a list of different goods’ prices. Mentions collecting debt in Adan, and persecution of merchants from Genoa in Alexandria. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 4, #794) VMR

A fragment of a Palestinian deed (maʿase) settling a marital dispute, affirming that the wife will be receive room and board from her husband's estate after his death. Information from Friedman, Jewish Marriage in Palestine, p. 443, n. 44.

Marriage contract between Natan b. Peraḥya and Malīḥa bat Yefet, Fustat, 1119. An enormous sheet illuminated in various colours and decorated with flowers. Very poorly preserved. Mentions 25 gold dinars as part of the dowry. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below.)

Document in Arabic script, perhaps a state petition or decree, beginning with "wa l-mamlūk yasʾal l-tawfīq" and mentions a wall "ṣūr"; reused for poetry in Judaeo-Arabic (see separate entry). Needs further examination.

Judaeo-Arabic poetry in the hand of Nāṣīr al-Adīb al-ʿIbrī. Large and well-preserved. Probably mainly love poetry.

Letter from an unknown writer, in Alexandria, to an unknown recipient, presumably in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: written in mahzor 275, which spanned the years 5207–25 (1446–65 CE). The writer greets the addressee as his 'brother', excuses his imposition (al-tahajjum (!) ʿalā faḍlikum) and mourns that the people of Alexandria have lost the science of intercalation, and requests that the addressee send him a calendar, starting with the upcoming Tishrei and extending to the end of mahzor 275. He sends regards to the addressee's wife, to his son Yehuda, and to Elazar Sofer. ASE.

Beautiful calligraphic fragment of deed of sale of a bathhouse in Zawilat al-Mahdiyya, Ifrīqiya, by one Jew to another. The seller describes the bath and mentions that the bathhouse had been acquired by his brother, as proved by the document of purchase produced in court. (Information from Mediterranean Society, V, pp. 98, 99)

Fragment of a legal document involving the execution of the will of a certain Avraham. Mentions Adoniya b. David, Shemuel ha-Levi b. Avraham, ʿAllūsh, and Avraham.

Fragment of a late ketubba, with sums in muayyadis, including the stipulation that the husband will not take a second wife without the bride's consent.

Accounts of a bookseller from first half of the 12th century, as it mentions Netanel ha-Shishi. There are lists in Judaeo-Arabic on both sides, as well as lists of names and numbers in Arabic script on both sides. The Judaeo-Arabic portions are edited by Allony et al. Arabic portion awaiting transcription.

Fragment of a deed of gift, given in Ramla, approximately 1030.

A confirmation of the Beit Din that there were no obstacles to the marriage between Sālim al-Ḥalabī al-Ṣabbāgh and Sitt al-Kuttāb b. Yefet. Fustat, 1153. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below.)

Legal testimony. Location: Damietta (אי כפתור). Dated: 20 Tishrei 1469 Seleucid, which is 1157 CE, under the reshut of the Nagid Shemuel b. Ḥananya. Denouncing a man named Yūsuf al-Rūmī (the Byzantine) who arrived in Damietta late in the afternoon one Friday, the eve of the first day of Sukkot, bearing a letter (of recommendation for charity) from the Nagid. On Sunday, the second day of Sukkot, he took the money raised on his behalf (more than a dinar) and a letter addressed to the perfumers' market in Sammanūd and a sewn basket (quffa makhtūṭa) and he embarked on the boat and traveled, violating the holiday. Witnesses: Yefet b. Shemuel; Shemuel b. Mevasser ha-Kohen

Deed in which Abū Isḥāq Abzārī gives the Nagid Avraham Maimonides the right to buy back the burj, a tower in the ancient Byzantine fortress of Fustat, for sixty dinars for a period of five years. The rent was waived. The deed is dated Tevet 4974 (1213/4) with the day of the month and week left blank, and no space is left for signatures. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below and Goitein MedSoc, Vol. 4, p. 87.)

Draft(?) of a court record. Dated: 29 Nisan 1543 Seleucid, which is April 1232 CE. The widow (Sitt al-)Tujjār bt. Manṣūr claims that 10 shares in a house in Bilbays belong to her children as heirs of her husband. Tujjār's sister-in-law's husband, Abū l-ʿAlāʾ b. Yosef ha-Kohen, produces Arabic deeds, not confirmed by a Jewish court, showing that the children's grandmother had sold him those shares. He asserted that in Bilbays such confirmations are not customary. Tujjār produces a Hebrew document witnessed, but not validated by a court. At the advice of experts, Abū l-ʿAlāʾ agrees to pay his nephews 300 dirhams. (Information from Goitein, Med Soc, vol. 4, p. 276, and Goitein notes and index card linked below.)

An engagement agreement from 1331. It looks like a registration in the court's notebook.

Codex containing 'the eight books of the Prophets.' With a dedication note. Raḥel bt. Shelomo who is connected somehow (דמתחכים?) to Ḥadīd b. Ayyūb b. Shelomo b. שתון b. מרב כשיתא, dedicated this volume to the qodesh of the Palestinian synagogue in Fustat. It may not be sold or redeemed. Whoever misuses it shall be excommunicated and cursed with the curse of Yehoshuaʿ b. Nun and Yehuda b. Yeḥezqel (cf. the scorpion-amulets T-S AS 143.26 and T-S NS 73.12). Whoever honors and reads it will be blessed with the blessings of Abraham the patriarch.

Petition to the Fatimid ruler Sitt al-Mulk from an official of a congregational mosque, perhaps the chief khaṭīb. This is probably the final copy of the petition. It has to do with delayed payments to the deputy khaṭīb Mūsā b. Azhar, since the tenants of the pious foundation (ḥabs) of the mosque have fallen in arrears and owe about ten dinars for the period ending Rajab 415 AH (September 1024). He requests that a decree (manshūr, line 11: literally, an open letter, a decree without a seal) be issued to the governor (ʿāmil) and administrator (mutawallī) of the district that housed the mosque asking them to help the deputy, Mūsā b. Azhar by supporting his efforts to extract payment from the tenants; by sending him money directly; and by generally enforcing the terms of the trust. On verso is a series of Hebrew biblical verses (Zach. 3:5–4:9) with the Aramaic translation (targum) added after each verse; the scribe has glued together these two petitions to form a single rotulus, suggesting that the Arabic documents may have survived together in an archive. The Arabic-script side of the fragment is missing a triangle of paper at the top that has remained attached to ENA 3974.3. Information from Marina Rustow's analysis and edition. A note on images: The FGP image of the Arabic side acquired from the Bodleian has cut off a few lines of the Arabic text and needs to be replaced. The image in Rustow, BSOAS 2010, is complete, but in black and white. The fragment was later rephotographed in color for Rustow, "The Fatimid Petition," Jewish History 2019. The FGP photo of the Hebrew-script side is complete. Note that the main Arabic-script documents on ENA 3974.3 and Bodl. MS heb. b. 18/23 do not join with each other.

Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Contract for the sale of flax following the dissolution of the partnership.Tiqva ha-Levi known as Abū l-Munā b. Peraḥya ha-Levi known Ibn al-Amʿaṭ sells to Abū l-Mufaḍḍal Netanel b. Peraḥya one-half of four gunny sacks (shakā'ir) of flax for 18 dinars and a mat with a scrap of flax (ḥuṣayra mushāqa) for 4 dinars. Signed by Ḥalfon as well as Yiṣḥaq b. Shemuel ha-Sefaradi. The small letters = Psalms 31:2. Information from Goitein's note card.

Marriage contract written in Tiberias Colonia, 1035.