Geniza Lab

Letter in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment (lower right corner). Mentions: ʿūd rīḥ; 3 dinars and a rubāʿī; Abū l-Ḥasan b. Hiba(?); ghārīqūn.

Business letter. In Judaeo-Arabic. Reporting on goods that arrived and prices (incl. mercury) and goods that were sent with the bearer of this letter (incl. pepper, clove).

List of tenants. In Judaeo-Arabic. "My tenants in the house in Ḥārat al-Zuwayla in the Alley of the Christians: Abū l-Faḍl Natan b. Yeshuʿa; Abū Kathīr Efrayim b. Mevorakh; al-wadīʿ(?) Ḥalfon b. Ḥayyim; al-Mufla [and] his daughter Sitt al-Bahā'."

Legal document. In Judaeo-Arabic. In the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Concerning [...] b. Hillel ha-Zaqen and Yosef ha-Kohen b. Moshe and commercial dealings.

Letter, apparently the second folio of what used to be two folios. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dealing with some business matters and containing an urgent request for the addressee to try to remember where he left the key to the chest belonging to the writer's shop. They have looked everywhere and cannot find it. It seems the mice have broken into the chest and are damaging the goods, mainly clothing (qad naqaba l-fa'ru l-ṣandūq wa-akalahu). The handwriting resembles that of CUL Or.1081 J28 (containing a similar complaint about mice). This letter also mentions business in cannabis (qunnab).

Letter from Yefet b. Menashshe to his brother Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. Mentions coral and Efrayim and a qirṭās containing 160 dirhams. The lower part of the letter is missing.

Court notebook, possibly. A bifolium. In the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. One entry is a deed of sale for a house which mentions Qaṣr al-Rūm, Kanīsat al-Rūm, Ḥammām al-Faʾr, Masjid al-Ḥājja, and Turmus St. Another document pertains to the marriage of Abū l-Maʿālī Avraham b. Ḥalfon and Farjiyya bt. Yiṣḥaq. Needs further examination. Information in part from (and join by) Moshe Yagur.

Letter from Yoshiyyahu, grandson of Yoshiyyahu Gaon, to Efrayim b. Shemarya, Fustat. Dating: ca. 1030. In Judaeo-Arabic with the address in Arabic script.

Letter fragment addressed to Maimonides. There is a lengthy introduction, and a few words of the body, in which the writer reports that he received the letter of Maimonides reporting that the wine was deposited with Umm Manṣūr. See Ashur, A. (2010). A new letter to Maimonides, T-S Misc.28.98. [Genizah Research Unit, Fragment of the Month, 2010]. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.55278.

Biblical (book of Numbers). Yemeni hand? On verso there is a pen trial: tajribat qalam wa-ḥibr malīḥ ṭāʾil.

Petition. In Arabic script. Probably sent from the village of Danūhiyya (modern spelling: دنوهيا) in the Sharqiyya district of the Nile Delta (the water situation in دنوهية is mentioned three lines from the bottom). Needs examination.

On recto an Arabic document or letter - needs examination. Verso: Book of Esther

On recto an Arabic document or letter. Another Arabic text on verso- needs examination.

Recto: Deed of sale for the purchase by Abū ʿAlī Ḥassān b. Ibrahim b. Azhar (the Jewish moneychanger) of two houses in Fusṭāṭ from Abū l-Munajjā Bahūr b. Shanute b. Baḥāsh (the Christian clerk). Witnessed by Yaḥyā b. al-[…], al-Ḥusaynī, and Ḥasan b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad Abū ʿUbaydallāh. Verso: Document relating to the purchase on the recto, and dated 480 AH (= 1087 CE). In this supplementary document, Yūsuf Ibn al-Baraka ‘the Jew’ gifts something (possibly the houses on recto) to ʿIzza and ʿAzīza, the daughters of his nephew. Also mentions al-Thābit b. Ḥasan.

Deed of sale for the purchase by Ibrahim b. Mūsā b. Ṣaliḥ the Jew of two houses and irrigated land to the north of Fusṭāṭ from Dāʾūd b. Azhar b. Ibrahim b. Azhar the Jew. Dated: 6 Ṣafar 498 AH (= 1104 CE). Witnessed by Al-Ḥasan b. al-Ḥusayn b. ʿAlī al-Anṣārī and ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. Ṭāhir b. Ismaʿīl. (Information from CUDL and Khan.)

Deed in which Abū Saʿd Efrayim b. ʿEli the Jew acquires the lease of a plot of land in Fusṭāṭ from Abū l-Futūḥ Ghālib b. Fahd, the clerk in charge of government foundations, under the supervision of Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. ʿUbaydallāh al-Qāʾifī. The property abuts the cemetery, a plot rented by Abū l-Ṭāhir b. al-Bayān, a plot rented by ʿAdwa bt. ʿAskar, and the house of Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥākim. Dated: Ṣafar 509 AH (July 1115 CE). Witnessed by Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. ʿUbaydallāh al-Qāʾifī, Ibrahim b. Aḥmad b. Manṣūr, Al-Ḥusayn b. Musāfir b. al-Ḥusayn b. Muḥammad, ʿAlī b. Ḥusayn b. Hibatallāh, and Murshid b. Yaḥyā Ibn al-Qāsim al-Madanī. Contains a phantom petition. On verso, the son of Efrayim, Abū l-Ḥusayn ʿEli b. Efrayim b. ʿEli the Jewish sawduster, transfers the leasehold of the property sold on recto to his son ʿAlī, by way of his uncle Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Ḥusayn, known as Ibn Ḥayyūn the cashier. Dated Shaʿbān 532 AH (May 1138 CE). Witnessed by Muḥammad b. ʿAlī b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad al-Qāʾifī and Hibatallāh b. Yaḥyā b. Muḥammad b. Jābir. (Information from Khan, from CUDL and from Marina Rustow)

Ketubba (date missing) for first cousins: the groom Netanel b. Shela b. Yosef b. Mordekhai ha-Kohen ha-Sar ha-Yaqar Zaqen ha-ʿEda and the virgin bride [...] bt. [...] b. Yosef b. Mordekhai ha-Kohen ha-Sar ha-Yaqar Zaqen ha-ʿEda. The sums named are in the hundreds of dinars. Information from Goitein's note card.

Verso: Magical conjuration (hashbaʿa). May mention Abū l-Karam. Needs examination.

Recto: Accounts in Arabic script. Possibly a state document. Looks complete. The first line is the glyph, then Abū Sahl, then Abū l-Faḍl al-Raʾīs. Needs further examination.

Document in the hand of Mevorakh b. Natan. Not entirely clear if it is a letter or legal document. It describes the measures that will be taken to discipline a certain Mūsā (l. 1) who has persisted in spreading slander (וצאעף אלרכילות, l. 2). He will be sternly warned (ll. 2–4), but if he continues to persist (l. 5), the communal leader (אבירנו) will remove three Torah scrolls from the ark, dress them in black, and blow the shofar before the congregations and excommunicate him. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.)