Geniza Lab

Account

Verso: Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic for food for workers; bread and vegetables. (Information from Goitein’s index card)

Recto: Letter in Arabic script. Fragment (bottom part only). Needs examination for content.

Receipt in Arabic script. For 'al-ḥākhām' Yaʿaqov Castro (يعقوب كاشترو), so this document probably dates to the 16th century (the precise date probably appears toward the bottom). There is a faded one-line filing note on verso in Judaeo-Arabic.

Letter from Musāfir b. Wahb (aka Araḥ b. Natan) to Abū l-Faḍl Hibatallāh Rosh ha-Qehillot. In Arabic script, with one line of the address in Hebrew. Dating: Early 12th century. Frenkel states that only the address has survived, but there are also five lines preserved of the main text on recto and additional text in the upper margin. This part awaits transcription. (Information in part from Frenkel.)

Fragment in Arabic script. Unidentified. Probably a literary text. Isolated words and phrases are legible: bi-l-malik Hārūn... ʿalaykum... alladhī... al-mustariqīn al-samʿa (this is what the shayāṭīn do)... al-khafaqān.

Letter in Arabic script. Needs examination. On verso there are a few lines of accounts.

State receipt? In Arabic script. وصل الى بيت المال المعمور...

Literary text in Arabic script. One of the text blocks is headed "Nuskha Kitāb Ṣidāq (=dowry?)," and a conventional introduction follows. On the other side (penultimate line), Quran 59:21 is quoted.

Letter fragment in Arabic script. The writer's name may appear between lines 2 and 3 (ʿabduhu Khalaf....?). Needs examination for content. On verso there is a copy of the beginning of the ʿAmida in very rudimentary Hebrew.

Recto: Letter from Abū Saʿīd to (his brother?) Sibāʿ and Munajjā and Abū l-ʿAlā'. In Arabic script. Unclear if the text on verso is part of the same letter or another letter. Needs examination.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Very faded. Mentions Yosef b. Ṣadaqa.

Business accounts in Arabic script, with some Hebrew mixed in (e.g. the name of the month Tevet).

Document(s) in very difficult Arabic script. Might be a medical prescription, but needs further examination.

Legal document(s) in Arabic script. Recto: Acknowledgment made by Najm b. Naḥrīr the 'mawlā' of Suʿadāʾ(?) bt. al-Ḥasan b. Muḥammad al-ʿAlawī(?) b. al-ʿAbbāsī(?) and Hilāl [...] b. al-ʿAlawī(?) b. al-ʿAbbāsī(?) and Muẓaffar b. Madkhūr the tailor, acting as agent for his wife Mulk/Malak. Dating: mentions the years 409 and 410 AH = ca. 1018–20 CE. Further down mentions real estate and various names (e.g., [...] b. Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ibn Ṭabāṭabā and payments. Needs further examination to understand the content. Verso: Addendum, possibly in the hand of the same scribe, and referring repeatedly to the original document on recto. Reporting that the husband of Ḥuml(?) bt. Naḥrīr the mawlā of Suʿadāʾ etc. collected on behalf of his wife a certain sum of money. Dated: 8 Rabīʿ I 410 AH. Needs further examination.

Draft of an Arabic text discussing the Hebrew months of Tevet and Shevat

Literary. Ilm-i Hal manual, a sort of Muslim catechism, written in Ottoman Turkish. Information from Jane Hathaway.

Legal document in Arabic script. Dating: Looks late Mamluk or early Ottoman era. Needs examination.

Recto: Order from a higher official, or a copy of one. Issuing instructions about looking after the property of 'the two noble mosques,' something to do with expenses (maṣraf), and helping a qāḍī and an ʿāmil advance the interests of the government (maṣlaḥat al-dīwān). Verso: Multiple notes in different hands, with ʿalāʾim. The first begins, "I copied the document of the sulṭān..." (presumably referring to recto). At the bottom there is the beginning of a letter to Sharaf al-Dīn. Needs further examination.

Power of attorney. In Arabic script. Dating: 11th or 12th century. A woman appoints the Jewish dyer Abū Saʿd b. Nājī b. Bū Naṣr as her agent. (Information from Goitein’s index card and Khan.)