Geniza Lab

Small fragment of a mercantile letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Cut diagonally across the text to make a rectangle. Mentions a dinar and a sixth, the price of the commodities, a request to send something to someone, an empty musk bag (nāfija fārigha) and half of something, and someone complaining of something.

Small fragment from the lower left corner of a legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Dated: Friday 21 [...] 1436 Seleucid = 1124/25 CE. No details preserved. (Information from CUDL)

Legal document. In the hand of Hillel b. ʿEli? Involves Abū l-Qāsim, Maʿālī, and secret plottings. (Information from CUDL)

Document, probably a letter, mentioning a judge and his paternal uncle Joseph, Abū l-Alā and several sums of dinars. (Information from CUDL)

Legal document written under the authority of Maṣliaḥ Gaʾon, dated to the 10th Elul 14[.]9 Seleucid era (= 1128-38 CE). Signed by Abraham b. Shemaʿya he-Ḥaver, descendant of Shemaʿya Gaʾon and Abraham b. Mikhal. (Information from CUDL)

Letter or memorial list. In Hebrew. Naming Elʿazar ha-Kohen.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Large but very faded. The writer asks the addressee to have Abū l-ʿIzz write something; perhaps the copies whose price is mentioned two lines later. (Information from CUDL)

Recto: Legal document, probably a deed of sale for a slave. This can be deduced because a seller certifies that something is free of defects (ʿuyūb), and a note at the end of the document indicates that the word "in slavery" (באלעבודיה) has been inserted in between the lines somewhere in the missing upper portion (see T-S 18J1.16 for the likely context of this word). The parties are Efrayim ha-Levi, Abū l-Ṭ[āhir?], and [...] b. Naḥman ha-Kohen the cantor, the father of Yakhin the agent (al-wakīl). On verso there is a commentary or learned discussion of the biblical prophets and kings of Israel, mentioning Iraq, Esther and the book of Daniel, and including Hebrew citations. (Information in part from CUDL)

Letter to Nathaniel the Seventh (השביעי בחבורת ארץ צבי). (Information from CUDL)

Recto: Small fragment of a letter in Arabic script. document. Verso: Hebrew text that looks like a legal document but might just be praising somebody - needs further examination. (Information in part from CUDL)

Letter; unidentified (Information from CUDL). One side is piyyut. The other has only fragments of Hebrew words.

Legal query. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragmentary. Mentions that a shimmush (court record? or simply a contract?) was drawn up between Reuven and Shemuel.

Original use: Small fragment of a letter in Arabic script. Formal and deferential, might be a state report or petition: من اهتمامها بذلك لا عد[متها . . . لاسارع الى قضاها . . . Secondary use: grammatical treatise in Judaeo-Arabic (handwriting of Hillel b. ʿEli?).

Literary text in Hebrew regarding blessings over the Torah. Late.

Fragment from the end of an 11th-century mercantile letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Either the sender or the scribe is named Abū l-Surūr, and he greets [...] b. Yehuda.

Small fragment with Hebrew script.

Literary text, probably, in Judaeo-Arabic and Hebrew. Mentions a king and "...ikhtiyāruhu iyyāhum min..."

Small fragment. Bottom part of a letter signed by [... b.] Shlomo Head of the Yeshiva. Maybe Masliah Gaon is intended. AA

Legal document mentioning the elder Abū l-Man[ṣūr] and [... b.] Ṭoviyya. (Information from CUDL)

Verso: Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. From the Jewish community of Ḥamāh (Hama, Syria). Seems to concern a communal controversy over ritual immersion ("...min amr al-ṭevila"). Mentions Rabbenu Yeḥiel (perhaps Yeḥiel the Frenchman, who was embroiled in ritual immersion politics in Jerusalem in the early 13th century; see the article of Roni Shweka, "And every day they make quarrels"). Also mentions a martyr who was killed in ʿAkko. Recto: unidentified text in Judaeo-Arabic and Hebrew, likely also a letter. Faded and damaged.