Geniza Lab

Secondary document: Accounts in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. Mentions a small qāʿa and a large qāʿa, perhaps also a ṭabaqa. For primary document, see alternate listing. This is the reverse of the usual case: an official Hebrew letter has been reused for Arabic-script accounts.

Official Hebrew letter, perhaps a circular (עתה אחינו...). Wide space between the lines. Only a small piece of the original is preserved here, with no clear identifying information. This is the reverse of the usual case: an official Hebrew letter has been reused for Arabic-script accounts.

Account ledger from the 1730s CE. 14 folios. It is mostly or entirely in Judaeo-Arabic, Hebrew, and Arabic. Currencies: mainly fonducli and cinzirli. Well-preserved and extremely rich, with details of properties and rents collected and communal expenses and expenses for the scribe's father (Mordechai b. ʿAmram, named in fol. 9r) during his terminal illness. There are also some pages of compositions in Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic (e.g. fols. 2 and 7), some of which may be letters (or drafts or copies). One of them mentions Khān al-Khalīl (fol. 2). Merits further examination.

Somewhat cryptic literary text in Judaeo-Arabic. Maybe ethical exhortations (yā bunayya...). Mentions the targum and may contain glosses on biblical passages. Also mentions various medical techniques (verso, bottom of righthand page) like purgation and bloodletting.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Mostly crossed out. Mentioning people such as the scribe's father, Ibn al-Wajīh, and Abū Naṣr. Mentioning goods such as saffron and a skin (jild). Also contains information about advances of money (istalaftu min fiḍḍat Ibn al-Wajīh... istalaftu l-dayn min Ibn al-Wajīh...). The folio was originally used for Judaeo-Arabic glosses on Eshet Ḥayil.

Hebrew poetry.

Accounts in a shorthand based on Hebrew script. Dating: Late, probably 18th or 19th century.

Magical treatise in Arabic and Judaeo-Arabic.

Responsa. A query whether milk milked on the Sabbath may be sold. Almost identical with T-S 13J9.10. (Information from Goitein’s index card)

Somewhat mysterious literary text containing aphorisms and poetic lines in Hebrew, Judaeo-Arabic, and Arabic. One of the Judaeo-Arabic lines refers to a bloodletting tray (qarūrat al-ḥijāma) studded with emerald and pearl. One of the Arabic lines is قد ضج زحر وشكا بثه مذ سخطت غصن على لافظ, a writing exercise that uses every letter of the alphabet once (if ى is counted as ي) and repeats only the alif.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. On a bifolium. Much of it is crossed out. The hand may be known. Dating: 11th or 12th century.

Responsa in Judaeo-Arabic. Filling a bifolium.

Literary treatise in Judaeo-Arabic. Soteriological: recounting the wars heralding the messianic era, involving Mashiaḥ ben David and Mashiaḥ ben Efrayim. Mentions the Byzantines, the Franks, and the book Seder ʿOlam.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. The hand may be known. Dating: 11th or 12th century. Mentions people such as Khalfūn and Ḥusayn. Mentions commodities such as sugar, brazilwood, pepper, beads (kharaz); walnuts; clove.

Synagogue accounts. Dating: 18th or 19th century. Probably headed Seder Balaq rather than Seder Kalla (as the Baker/Polliack catalog has it). List of names and numbers, some associated with honors in the synagogue service (e.g., 9 — haftara — Shelomo Ashkenazi). Other names are al-Shaykh; Yosef b. Yoqer; Eliyyahu Condiote; Shemuel(?) Fuerte. On verso there are more accounts in Judaeo-Arabic, mainly listing foods: almonds, hazelnuts, chard, fava beans.

Letter from a man to his father or teacher. On a bifolium. The first half is in Hebrew and the second half in Judaeo-Arabic. The handwriting evolves significantly from the beginning to the end, but this may simply be due to writing faster and with less care; it does not necessarily mean that there are two different scribes. Dating: no earlier than 1141 CE, as Yehuda ha-Levi is dead; if 'al-Nezer' refers to Natan b. Shemuel, that would date the letter to no later than ~1153 CE. In the Hebrew portion, the sender repents of having scorned the addressee's wisdom and education, offers eloquent praises for the addressee, and mourns the absence between them. In the Judaeo-Arabic portion, he asks for copies of a number of liturgical poems, including 5 or 6 "ʿAmmānī ghurabā'(?)" raḥamim. He adds, " Ever since I have left Damascus, I intend to devote myself to the calling of a cantor. For this purpose, I have borrowed the diwans of Shelomo the Little (the famous Ibn Gabirol) and of Yehuda ha-Levi—may their memory be blessed—and made excerpts from them for my use" (Goitein, Med Soc II, p. 221 n. 10). He has also borrowed a siddur and has been studying the prayers in it. He asks the addressee to send the requested items with Sālim the ghulām of al-Thiqa. Whatever the cost of the paper and the copyist, the sender will reimburse it. He adds that on Tisha b'Av, al-Muhadhdhab and al-Nezer and his brother approached him and asked him to compose a dirge based on אשתונן ואתאונן (it seems referring to Aharon Ibn al-ʿAmmānī's dirge with the same opening: see BL OR 10594.4). The sender then records his own version of אשתונן ואתאונן at the bottom of the letter, "based on a laḥn I learned from you." It does not appear that the dirge here is the original אשתונן ואתאונן or that this sender is Aharon Ibn al-ʿAmmānī himself (whose handwriting is known from T-S 13J14.25). ASE

Literary work. Ethical exhortations arranged as answers to queries.

Legal queries and responsa.

Love poetry in Judaeo-Arabic, probably. (Upper right of recto refers to a beloved singing woman (mughanniyya) and the remainder seems filled with references to beautiful body parts.) Each stanza ends with the same or similar refrain. It may be a kind of debate poem, as there is "wa-radda" and "man radda" in the refrain before the subsequent stanza. Some of the stanzas are extremely similar to each other, except that the orthography differs. This entire interpretation is tentative, because the handwriting is dreadful and the orthography even worse. The letter ד is alternately rendered as ד ,ת ,and ט. The letter צ is alternately rendered as צ and ז.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. The hand may be known. Dating: 11th or 12th century.