Geniza Lab

Letter (late, 15th century onwards), in tiny handwriting, dealing with the silk trade. (Information from CUDL)

Letter to Rafael Mammon חרוק from Shabbetay Skandarī, mentioning Ḥayyim Barukh and Abraham Ḥefeṣ. (Information from CUDL)

Letter from an unidentified sender, probably somewhere in the Rīf, to Abū l-Ḥasan Yefet al-Khāzin. In Judaeo-Arabic. Mentioning people such as the tax farmer Abū Sulaymān and Abū l-Faḍl Ibn Fakhr. (Information from CUDL.) Needs further examination.

Letter addressed to Yosef ha-Levi. In Judaeo-Arabic. Deals with a visit to the synagogue at Dammūh during a time of unrest. The sender explains that he comes into Fustat to greet all his friends and relatives, because he would worry about them if they traveled to see him. He ran into Abū l-Ḥasan, the son of the addressee, who was stubbornly insistent on going to Dammūh. The sender tried mightily to dissuade him from going there at all. Finally he succeeded in getting Abū l-Ḥasan to ride with him by boat instead of walking there. They arrived safely and prayed with the quorum. Abū l-Ḥasan is now insisting on staying there all day Tuesday and only coming back to Fustat on Wednesday. The sender tries to persuade him to return on Tuesday (the day of this letter) but without success. The sender insists that he is not neglecting Abū l-Ḥasan or encouraging his idleness. The addressee must not blame him. ASE

Letter addressed by Moshe Ha-Kohen to Menahem the great Rabbi (HaRav HaGadol). VMR The letter is prefaced with בשמ׳ רחמ׳, followed by three biblical verses, before a laudatory Hebrew opening section. The letter breaks off just as the business of the letter begins with ינהי למושבו. Late 12th-13th century.

Recto and verso: Letter to the Nagid. In Judaeo-Arabic. Politely disputing a quotation used in his sermon on the preceding Saturday, the topic of which was that even the greatest Talmudic scholar, Rabbi ʿAqiba, was a sinner in his youth. The sender suggests in a postscript that the ʿAqiba b. Yosef mentioned in this context in Bava Meṣiʿa (though Goitein's note card points out that his citation is actually incorrect, and it should be ʿArakhin 16b) must have been a different ʿAqiba. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 2:158–59, 553) EMS

Verso: Legal document in Arabic script. Headed by an ʿalāma: tawakkaltu [...] ʿalā Allāh. The Arabic word at the bottom of the page may also be some sort of registration mark (or signature of the scribe?). In which the undersigned Bayān b. Mūsā and Abū Surūr b. Abū l-Majd report the death of the Jew Yūsuf al-[...] al-Ṣaghīr b. Ibrāhīm al-Ṣabbāgh on the date of Tuesday, 27 Dhū l-Qaʿda 632 AH, which is 13 August 1235 CE. Yūsuf's heirs are his father Ibrāhīm al-M[...] and his son [...] [...] Makārim(?). Cf. Khan, ALAD, docs. 125–31 for a cluster of similar documents from the same period.

Letter addressed to Eli (‘Allun) ha-parnas, active 1057-1107, which mention his less well-known son, the parnas Abu Kathir (Efrayim ha-Kohen b. ‘Eli). (Oded Zinger, Women, Gender and Law: Marital Disputes According to Documents of the Cairo Geniza, 359) EMS

Note in which a physician is asked to help a captive woman, imprisoned probably due to debt. The addressee responds with a brief note on verso stating that he will fulfill the request. He crosses out the sender's self-abasement from the original letter and replaces it with "rather, I am your slave." Cf. Bodl. MS heb. f 101/43 and T-S 6J5.18 for the same phenomenon.

Letter to Abu Yaʿaqov Yosef the Dyer, from Perahya b. Yosef informing him that he arrived in Alexandria and found Yosef’s wife and children to be well. He further describes that he met with the addressee’s cousin and that he should send his wife something because she had to pawn an item to pay rent. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS C. 11th century - but unusually refers to ‘your wife’ as זוגתך (who also seems to be involved in some of the business activities). (Information from CUDL)

Epistolarium fragment in Hebrew. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS Part of a letter, with widely-spaced lines, probably 11th century and from Iraq. It addresses the recipient in the 2nd person plural. The text remaining is mostly oratorical. The writer sends greetings from his cousin Zakkai and from ‘all the sages of the two Yešivot’. There is a quote from Psalms 59:17, marked with supralinear dots. (Information from CUDL)

Letter opening, fragmentary, from Yosef ha-Kohen b. Shelomo Gaon to a friend (11th century).

Letter from a former official and representative of the Nagid (na’ib) of the Alexandrian community to the Nagid, requesting that he intervene on the writer’s behalf so that he may obtain the pesiqa money and fees that the community leaders still owe him. (Miriam Frankel, “Charity in Jewish Society of the Medieval Mediterranean World,” in Charity and Giving in Monotheistic Religions, ed. M. Frankel and Y. Lev, 2009, 349-50) EMS

Recto: Letter fragment to a distinguished person named Abū l-Barakāt b. [...], titled Sar Menuḥa and Sar Shalom. Contains profuse well-wishes for the addressee's recovery from his illness (r5–12), and concerns a question about a bill of divorce (between lines 13 and 14). The letter mentions the town of Ṣahrajt (at the top) and Yosef b. Azhar (at the bottom). Verso: Letter fragment. In Hebrew, with two lines in Arabic script at the bottom. The handwriting is slightly different from that on recto. Probably 11th or 12th century. (Information from CUDL.) EMS. VMR. ASE.

Letter addressed to Shelomo Ḥalafta Yerushalmi and Meir Ashkenazi, concerning business, the commodity saffron (זעפראן)" is mentioned. R. Yiṣḥaq Luria (ha-Ari) was a part of this business as well. (Information from David Avraham, Alei Sefer 14, 1987, p. 135, and David Avraham, “The Role of Egyptian Jews in Sixteenth-century International Trade with Europe,” in From a Sacred Source: Genizah Studies in Honour of Professor Stefan C. Reif,” 106 ). VMR and EMS Verso: Jottings of names and accounts, mentioning Rašīd and Nissim Sason. C. 15th-17th century. (Information from CUDL)

The text is almost completely vocalised and rhymes in -akh. It seems to be more of a poem than a letter; it breaks off mid-sentence, but there is no continuation on verso. However, it does address someone in the 2nd person singular and requests him to pass on his regards to Mevorakh when he reaches the ‘fortified city’, ועת תגע לעיר מבצ[ר] בחסדך קרא נא את שלומ[י] על מבורך. (Information from CUDL)

Letter draft from Yosef b. Yaʿaqov ha-Bavli to the dignitary ʿOvadya. In Judaeo-Arabic. The addressee is titled Amīn al-Dawla Thiqat al-Mulk, “Trusted by the Dynasty, Relied upon by the Government.” The writer wishes him “to find plenty of favor in the eyes of kings and ministers,” and indicates that ʿOvadya possessed some familiarity with Hebrew literature. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 5:271, 582.) EMS. "All that reaches a man with respect to praise [al-madīḥ] and sincere thanks [al-shukr al-ṣarīḥ] falls short with regard to the lofty lord, confidant of the state, security of kingship, our lord and master Ovadiah the minister, the noble, the wise, the intelligent, may God extend his grace, elevate his status, and give him abundant fortune in the eyes of kings and ministers. May he bless his brothers and his sons the ministers and may they be a blessing in the midst of the land. All that they address before him [of praise and thanks] is but a fraction of what is said when he is not present according to what the rabbis [al-awāʾil], may God be satisfied with them, made clear in their saying, “One says little of a man’s praise before him but all of it when not before him.” They said this because we have found that God, lofty and exalted, when Noah was not present, described him with three qualities—righteous, upright, and so on—but when he addressed him, He said, “For I have seen you righteous before me” and so on. He described him as righteous only." Trans. Jonathan Decter, Dominion Built of Praise, pp.18–20.

Verso: Draft of a letter (or letters) in the hand of Yosef b. Yaʿaqov ha-Bavli that mentions Shelomo ha-Kohen Segan ha-Kohanim. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 5:271, 582) EMS

Letter from Nissim b. Salāma to Abū Saʿd Khalaf b. Salāma. In Judaeo-Arabic. Concerning commercial matters, including a grocer ordering for his store one hundred pounds of raisins (zabib), and one wayba each (about twenty-three pounds) of rice and sesame. It seems that some of the rice will be supplied by Abū ʿImrān. Nissim then asks Abū Saʿd not to use Arabic script since he didn't know how to read it and had to trouble friends to read him the letters received and then would sometimes forget what he had heard. (Information from Goitein, Med Soc 2:179, 557 and 4:439.) Join: Oded Zinger.

Decree. The beginnings of 5 lines are preserved (...waṣala ilā thaghr...). The word "kiswa" appears - referring to the covering of the Kaʿba? Reused for accounts in Arabic script (also on recto) and a letter in Judaeo-Arabic (on verso).