Geniza Lab

Image not available. According to Schwarb Catalogue: From Elijah the judge, Damietta. AA

Letter from Madmun b. Ḥasan to Avraham Ibn Yiju: first pick of merchandise for Bilal b. Jarir. Aden, between 1136-1138 or 1145-1149.

Commentary on the book of Job, probably. In Hebrew. Calligraphic. איני מבקש אלא לדבר אליו ולהתווכח עמו . . . מחברי דברי שקר רופאי אליל כולכם מרגלים כמו לאללא ית ארעא כלום אם באתם לבקר אותי לא באתם אלא לשמוע מה אדבר

Fragment (first five lines) of a Judaeo-Arabic letter in lovely handwriting to Ibrāhīm al-[...] from his son. The writer received the receipts and tells Ibrāhīm to come. The word "al-maghāriba" or "al-maghāribī" appears in the sender side of the address on verso. ASE.

Letter from Abū l-Majd to his cousin Eliyyahu the Judge. It deals with questions of travel; mentions someone in Damascus; mentions al-Maḥalla, Bilbays, Fusṭāṭ, and Cairo. He asks to be sent "the wakāla" (power of attorney) and 200 dirhams (?). The letter closely resembles CUL Or.1080 J235 (same sender, recipient, some of the same subjects), in which Abū l-Majd said "I have sent you many letters on this matter and not received a response." ASE.

Possibly a Hebrew letter. Late. Needs further examination.

Letter from Avraham b. Yiṣḥaq al-Andalusi, Jerusalem, to his partner Abū Yaʿqūb Yosef b. ʿEli ha-Kohen Fāsī, Fustat, ca. 1052. This was Avraham's first sojourn in Jerusalem. He was anxious not to have received word from Yosef for a long time, but just now encountered a Maghribi who came from the West on the same boat as Yosef, and showed Avraham some letters he brought from Yosef. Avraham was saddened to hear of Yosef's financial loss with Barhūn [b. Mūsā al-Taherti]. He thanks Yosef for concening himself with the sale of the garments. "But here we cannot wear more than patched, flax garments, for the land is 'exhausted from the events' and neither stores nor houses are open." (Gil glosses 'li-l-aḥdāth kalāl' as due to armed bands roving the country and notes that Chapira translated it as 'the farmers are wretched.') "As for what you asked regarding my situation here and whether I am making a living, the land is dead; its people are poor and dead, especially in Jerusalem; no one slaughters an animal either on a weekday or on the sabbath, and there is no fowl to be had. It is very cold, and God willing I will depart after the small fast." He asks Yosef to use part of the 10 dinars to purchase for Avraham's orphan cousin (bint khālatī) two scarfs (miʿjarayn), one blue and one green, and a mantle (mandīl) for a Torah scroll, and to send them with Barhūn—or with anybody else—to Qayrawān. He asks Yosef, for the sake of the ʿaṣabiyya between them, to look after the dukkān and take Avraham's place there. He sends regards to Isḥāq, Mūsā, Avraham al-Kohen, and Nahray. He especially sends his congratulations to Nahray on recovering from the illness that he contracted in Barqa. Here, at the end of the letter (v15–19), Avraham recounts that he was desperately ill, bedbound for one month in Ramla and for even longer in Jerusalem, but he recovered, barukh gomel le-ḥayavim ṭovot. No one had any hope for his recovery, neither he nor those around him. (This is also how Chapira understood "mā ṭamaʿa binā aḥad lā anā wa-lā man ʿindī" and "mā ṭamaʿa lanā aḥad bi-l-ḥayā." Gil seems mistaken in reading this as an idiom for "let no one be envious of us," because it is a common trope in Geniza narratives of critical illness to emphasize how everyone had despaired.) Yosef would not even credit it if Avraham told him how much money he had lost from the time he left the dukkān to the present moment. He concludes again with greetings to the same friends as before, and to their families, and to Abū Zikrī Yehuda. The address is in Arabic script: to Fusṭāṭ, to al-Maʿārij (?), at the gate of Dār al-Birka. There follow at least four (Muslim) names of the deliverers. ASE.

Fragment (lower right corner) of a letter of appeal (begging letter) in Hebrew. ASE.

Recto: Fragment (upper right corner) of a Judaeo-Arabic letter to Abū l-Barakāt regarding a fatwā and the nagid Av[raham]. Verso: Three lines of neat Arabic at the top, significance unclear but possibly medical in nature. Below are several recipes (medical prescriptions?) in Judaeo-Arabic. ASE.

Late letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Menahem b. Yosef is named in the first line. ASE.

Verso: Letter probably from Binyām the druggist of Rashīd, in Alexandria, to Abū Saʿīd al-ʿAfṣī, in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: 12th century. (This sender, who left us numerous letters, has a confusing habit of writing מולאי אבו סעיד בניאם at the tops of his letters, making it seem that Binyām is part of Abū Saʿīd's name.) The letter entirely consists of instructions for selling and buying pharmaceutical goods, including wormwood (afsantīn), tamarind, and antimony (rāṣakht). Abū [...] Ibn Shaʿyā is mentioned. Written on a recycled official document (PGPID 30345). ASE.

Petition or official report (?). Arabic script, wide line-spacing, quasi-chancery hand. Lower left corner; the document was trimmed and reused for a Judaeo-Arabic letter (PGPID 30345).

Late bifolium, with two pages of prose followed by verses of a kinnah, concluding with an interesting illustration containing Arabic letters and the scribe's signature: Moshe Tanis (משה טאניס). ASE.

Late letter(s) in Judaeo-Arabic. There is writing on Page 4 as well as Page 1.

Late letter in Judaeo-Arabic, dated Heshvan 5568 (1807 CE), from Shelomo [...] Konpanya to Karo & Frances & Company (numerous letters to the same addressee have survived: see tag). ASE.

Recto: Legal document, draft. In Hebrew. Location: Fustat/Cairo. Dated: 1 Tammuz 5494 AM, which is 1734 CE. Avraham Delmar (דילמאר) leases a property (an ʿaliya) to Yeshuʿa ha-Kohen. Period of lease: 1 year. The location of the property is described in relation to the houses owned by Rosh Mishmeret Yehuda Medina. The rent for the entire 12 months is 11 zincirlis. Yeshuʿa pays 6 zincirlis in advance. It seems that the remaining 5 zincirlis will be paid in two installments of 2 findiklis (2 findikli = 2.5 zincirli). There follow further conditions. There are no witness signatures and the document is crossed out with four vertical lines. Verso: Legal document, perhaps a draft. Dating: Not long before or after 1734 CE, based on the dating of recto. Involving a partnership between Yaʿaqov Mizraḥi b. David of Salonika and Binyamin b. Astrugo of Salonika. The joint business venture is the export of רופאס (=clothing, in Ladino?) from Rashīd and Alexandria to Izmir. Currency: findikli. Needs further examination. ASE.

Two letters, one in Ladino and one in Judaeo-Arabic. The remainder of the pages are filled with sums, accounts, a couple Arabic signatures, and geomancy markings. ASE.

Letter from Moshe Ḥakīm and "Senyora," in Fustat/Cairo, to Ḥayyim Rosano, in Manṣūra. In Judaeo-Arabic, elegant hand. Dating: Probably late 18th or early 19th century. This is a thank you letter. The writer alludes to how he was in difficult straits (rizqī dayyiq = ḍayyiq) and how everything in Miṣr is expensive. It seems that Ḥayyim previously gave or loaned him money. Regards from the addressee's maternal aunt. On verso there are sums in eastern Arabic numerals. ASE.

Letter from Mardūk b. Mūsā to Nahray b. Nissim.

Late letter in Judaeo-Arabic to Senyor Karo y Frances & Company (numerous letters to the same addressee have survived: see tag). Needs further examination. ASE.