Geniza Lab

Business accounts in Arabic script and eastern Arabic numerals. Probably late.

Fragment from a legal deed. In the hand of the court scribe Yosef b. Shemuel ha-Levi. One of the parties is Eliyyahu ha-Levi, who is titled פאר [ה . . . .] רצוי הנשיאות. Another is Abū l-Riḍā. May concern a loan of 85 dinars to be repaid over a period of 2 years. AA. ASE.

Business accounts. In Judaeo-Arabic. The hand may be known. Dating: perhaps 12th century.

Magical instructions, probably. Involving sex with a woman (fulāna bt. fulāna, ll.5–6). Needs further examination.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Late, probably early 19th century. Mentions Yaʿaqov Bibas; Yiṣḥaq Fransīs; Yaʿaqov Shalom; Gedalya Rosal(?); Eliyyahu Ṣahal (perhaps the same who appears in AIU VII.D.99, BL Or. 12369.11, and Evr. II A 1292 in 1822 CE)

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic (in a rudimentary hand) and Arabic script (in a better hand). Mentions amounts owed to various people, e.g., Abū Waḥsh and Abū l-Khayr Ṣadaqa.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Difficult hand. Possibly late.

Business accounts in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. Mentions names such as the wife of Ibn al-Malīḥ(?) (in connection to a gold needle); Abū Isḥāq; Abū ʿAbdallāh; al-Faqīh Abū ʿAbdallāh; a simsār; Naṣr al-Ḥājj. On verso there are larger blocks of text, it seems mainly describing various textiles/garments.

Fatimid state document with an ʿalāma (al-ḥamdu lil-lāh ka-mā huwa ahluhu). Many text blocks, many hands. On one side, l. 4 mentions al-Imām al-Mustanṣir Billāh (i.e., the caliph). Another text block on the same side mentions Hiba b. Isrāʾīl and the date Dhū l-Ḥijja 430 AH, which is August/September 1039 CE. Needs further examination.

Table in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. Chancery hand? Needs examination.

Accounts in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. Mentions names such as ʿAbdallāh; Bū l-Faraj; Jawhar; Samawʾal; Ibn Naṣrallāh; Mīkhāʾīl; Saʿīd; Wahba(?); Sīmān(?); Muḥammad. Dating: Perhaps 13th or 14th century, but this is a guess.

Letter, probably. In Arabic script. 3 full lines are preserved, and portions of another ~8 lines. Needs examination.

Table in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. Presumably accounts of some kind. Needs examination.

Document in Arabic script. Faded/damaged. Needs examination.

Accounts in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals. 5 lines. Needs further examination for content.

Receipt for the capitation tax of Ibrāhīm b. Yūsuf the Jew, a silk worker (qazzāz) and craftsman (ṣāniʿ). Same payer: T-S Ar.34.224, T-S Ar.34.282 (where he is called qazzāz wa-ʿaṭṭār instead), T-S Ar.35.55, and T-S Ar.35.22. This fragment has text in 5 different hands.

Document in Arabic script. Needs examination.

Letter addressed to Abū l-Faraj Yosef b. Yaʿaqov (Ibn ʿAwkal) and his two sons Hilāl/Hillel and Binyamin. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dated: Rabīʿ I 407 AH, which is 1016 CE (this is the date of the arrival of the letter, recorded in Arabic script next to the address). The name of the sender is faded, but may be legible with effort. The sender has recently lost his only son in a particularly traumatic way (at sea?). There is no grave to visit and feel consoled, and there was no period of illness during which his father could care for him (this part is not completely clear, ll.4–5). "It is now a month and a half that my weeping [is greater?] than the waves of the sea." The bottom part of recto and the upper part of verso are torn away. At some point he turns to business matters and mentions various sums of money. This letter is uncited in the literature. Cf. CUL Or.1080 J154 for another letter addressed to Ibn ʿAwkal and his two sons from 8 years earlier. (Evidently Ibn ʿAwkal's other two sons Abū Sahl Menashshe and Abū Saʿīd Khalaf were not born until after 1016?). For information on Ibn ʿAwkal and his family, see Stillman, "The Eleventh Century Merchant House of Ibn ʿAwkal (A Geniza Study)," JESHO 16 (1973), 15–88.

Distribution of wheat to Byzantines (thabat al-Rūm). Belongs with T-S K15.113. Dating: ca. 1100–40 CE.

Document in Arabic script. Needs examination.