Geniza Lab

Image 1: The end of an account in Arabic, along with what might be a fragment of a legal document discussing buildings in ḥārat al-yahūd. Image 2: Blank except for some sums. Image 3: A column of nearly 40 names in Judaeo-Arabic (several from the Yuʿbaṣ family) along with a column of Arabic names, most or all of which are the equivalents of the names on right. Image 4: More of a legal-looking Arabic document discussing buildings.

Arabic writing exercises including "lillahi waḥdahu" three times.

Legal document in Arabic script. Only the witness signatures are preserved, e.g., ʿAlī b. ʿAbdallāh and Bū Bakr [...] b. ʿAbdallāh. Verso: love poetry also in Arabic script, ending with the rhyme ʿaīn(rawī).

Letter in Arabic script. Dating: Uncertain, maybe late Mamlūk/early Ottoman. The name Abū Ḥamza (?) can be read in the place of the tarjama. Mentions al-Rayyis Yūsuf, a vessel (markab), and the condition of young boys/children. "I inform you, do not ask me what the boys/children are going through everyday....for their sustenance..very little, a piece of bread in the morning and another (in the evening?)." Seems like a plea for the children for not getting enough to eat. On verso there are accounts in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. Needs further examination

State document. Dated: 26 Ramaḍān 524 AH = 2 September 1130 CE. A makhzūma (a type of official account) concerning the construction of a new or renovated belvedere (manẓara) across from either the Rawḍa island or a specific government garden (muqābil al-rawḍa al-saʿīda). Begins with the header "makhzūma," followed by, "bi-mablagh al-munfaq fī ʿimārat al-manẓara al-mustajadda al-maʾmūr bi-inshāʾihā." The project is overseen by officials with titles such as "majd al-khilāfa wa fakhruha" and "ṣanīʿat al-khilāfa." One may be named al-Qāḍī [...] al-ʿUmr (?) ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (?). They are both described as "mutawallī al-maʿūna bi-Miṣr." Al-Maqrīzī mentions this position during the Fatimid Caliph al-ʿĀmir's time in 515 H (See Ittiʿāẓ, III, p. 69). The date on the document is 524 H which fits with al-Maqrīzī's chronology, hence, it is plausible that the person referred to in the chronicle could be one of the officials mentioned in the document. Goitein translates 'maʿūna' as "a police building, although containing gruesome prisons, was called maʿūna, 'help' while the security forces themselves were divided into a number of specialized groups. The head of the police was called wālī, literally, 'governor'" (Goitein, Mediterranean Society, II:368). There are also copious other jottings in Arabic, most of them poetry and some pen trials. Needs further examination.

A leaf from a work on sexual medicine & aphrodisiacs in Arabic.

A damaged page from a diwan, probably, of Arabic poetry

Legal document. In Arabic script. Dating: The year is effaced, but it looks Ottoman-era. There is a faded filing note in Judaeo-Arabic on verso. Involves a Muslim named Saʿīd and Jews named Yaʿqūb and Dāʾūd. Needs examination for content.

Recto: The first few lines of an Ottoman-era legal document, bearing two seals and an annotation in a different hand, opening with an invocation of the Porte (bi-l-bāb al-ʿālī aʿlāhu) and pertaining to a certain Hanbali judge named Aḥmad b. Aḥmad Ḥijāzī al-Ajhūrī. Verso: In Hebrew script, the name of a syangogue or congregation (קק סקאלבין?).

Disorganized writings in Hebrew, Arabic, and Judaeo-Arabic, in all different directions. There are two lines from an official-looking calligraphic Arabic document. Needs further examination.

14 pages of a Persian treatise on poetic meters and general eloquence. The text of the treatise may be found on pages 3–4 and 7–18. There are only a few, faded lines on page 4. There is a single word on page 6. The table of contents is on page 8. There are many lines of Persian poetry cited, starting on page 9. There is a doodle of a tree on page 17. There are a few words in Latin script (French?) on page 19.

A leaf from Avicenna's Qanun, including the chapter on fattening any organ, such as arm, leg, nose, lips, or penis.