Geniza Lab

P16: Letter from Yefet b. Menashshe to one of his brothers. Fragment (upper left corner of recto). The addressee is likely Ḥalfon b. Menashshe (rather than Peraḥya), since this fragment is surrounded by other fragments from the Ḥalfon dossier. Only formulaic greetings are preserved.

P17: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. One man grants a release to another. No other details preserved.

P18: Unidentified fragment with several lines of Hebrew script on it. Maybe a letter, or maybe literary. Needs examination.

P19: Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Unidentified sender and addressee. Fragment (horizontal section from the middle). Mentions: Khiyār; someone who said in his letters that he would come, which caused distress to some man (a frail father?), "making him go from one state to another, and are his pain and 'dispersion' (tashattut, cf. T-S 10J19.7) not enough for him?"; testimonies by Binyām and Benaya; and previous correspondence and delayed letters.

P2: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Refers to a partnership, 'the religion of the rabbis (or Rabbanites?),' and Abū l-ʿAlāʾ.

P20: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. The first letters of ~15 lines are preserved. No details discernible.

P21: Legal document. In the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Refers to: Abū Yaʿqūb; Abū Saʿd and his paternal cousin (ibn ʿamm); a male orphan named Abū Kathīr(?); his reaching maturity (bulūgh); and the exilarch (adonenu Nagid ha-Gola).

P22 + P25: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Dated: Tammuz 1430 Seleucid, which is 1119 CE. Involves: [Yosef] b. Mevorakh (the same as in T-S 24.74 from 1104 CE?); his ṣihr (son-in-law in this context) Abū l-Khayr b. Seʿadya; and Abū l-Khayr’s wife named [Ḥu]sn bt. Yūsuf. Her father (Yūsuf) wished to move her from the house of Abū l-Khayr's mother, but Abū l-Khayr refused. The court forced him to go along with it. There is a complicated discussion and settlement involving the dowry (qumāsh), compensation to her for the wear and tear on the dowry, the delayed marriage payment (muʾakhkhar), and the court compelling Abū l-Khayr to move. All this is tentative, pending the identification of the remaining joins. Join: Alan Elbaum.

P23: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Refers to a house, Avraham, and his mother.

P24: Legal document. Refers to a half-dinar; Avraham; Abū ʿAlī; and the house where they live together.

P3: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Refers to the purchase of a property; someone titled 'sar'; "that is on the island (al-jazīra)";

P4: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Deathbed will of Yefet b. Yaʿaqov. He wills that his share in the rent of a house that he held in partnership with others (Ibn al-Dhahabī, Avraham al-Fuqqāʿī, Avraham b. [...], Abū Manṣūr al-Zayyāt) should be spent in two equal shares, one on bread for the poor and the other on a person specified by name. (Information from Goitein, Med Soc II, App. A, no. 180.)

P5: Legal jottings in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Only a few words are preserved, no details.

P6: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Refers to [Sitt al-Sāda bt.] Evyatar ha-Kohen the Palestinian Gaʾon, who is the wife of Abū l-Makārim. Also mentions the agent Abū l-Riḍā Shelomo [b. Mevorakh]; Abū l-Faḍl Shela; and [...] b. al-Baṣrī. Evidently related to the same case as T-S NS J11 + T-S 10J4.16 + T-S 16.158 + T-S 10J4.17 (PGPID 7847). And see ENA NS 77.275, which mentions a woman related to Evyatar and [Abū l-Riḍā Shelomo] b. Mevorakh.

P7 + P11: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Partnership agreement. Tamīm ha-Kohen will be the active partner, traveling to Yemen and importing merchandise to Egypt. Someone titled Rosh ha-Qehillot will invest money into the shared capital (khulṭa). (This Tamīm may be the same Tamīm ha-Kohen who is already dead in Moss. VII,39—which also involves a Rosh ha-Qehillot—and in T-S 6J12.9 and in T-S AS 211.81.) Join: Alan Elbaum. The join is not continuous and therefore not 100% certain.

P8: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Refers to a woman who owes a debt, a dead man, and a man's wife. Then quotes a dialogue between two men. Verso may be the continuation. Refers to 50 dinars; the daughter of the sister of the dead man; a woman's husband; Ṭoviyya's satisfaction with the settlement.

P9: Legal document in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Small fragment from the beginning. Mentions two judge and Abū l-ʿAlāʾ ʿUlla.

Letter of recommendation in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. He describes the suffering two people underwent and asks for help on their behalf.

Letter fragment. In Judaeo-Arabic. Possibly in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe.

Letter in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe, probably addressed to his brother Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment (lower part of recto). Mentions: the sale of something by Efrayim; something that should be sent with Ibn al-Dawāniqī(?) ('the penny pincher'); an urgent request to write to al-qāḍī al-makīn about something that will help Yefet; something "this year in al-Mahdiyya"; regards to Sitt Naʿīm (Ḥalfon's wife). This document was reused for legal jottings in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe, which mention Sutūt the wife of Khalaf b. Qashqūsh; a real-estate transaction; and a quarter of house in Qaṣr al-Shamʿ in the alley of the shop (zuqāq al-dukkān) in partnership with Aharon ha-Kohen.