Geniza Lab

Formal letter in Arabic script. Fragment (upper part only). Dating: Probably Mamluk or early Ottoman-era. The sender reports that he met with somebody (the addressee himself? looks like al-makhdūm) in the house of the qāḍī Nāṣir al-Dīn.

Accounts in Arabic script. Sums in dinars and qirats. Mentions a dukkān. Needs examination.

Medical prescription or recipe in Arabic script. Possibly sharāb rummān, a pomegranate syrup. The penultimate line reads, "The whole body should be anointed with the oil of violet (banafsaj) and almond (lawz)." Hebrew literary text on verso.

Tax receipt from the archive of Abū l-Ḥasan b. Wahb, Fatimid. One registration mark: al-ḥamdu lil-lāh ʿalā niʿamih.

List in Arabic script. Accounts?

List or accounts on recto, verso contains several lines of some kind of draft (crossed out) and the rest is pen trials

A leaf of the astronomical tables devised for the years 900-1500 CE. Only two dates come into question for the year 631/1234 (Ayyubid period). Date h.☉☾♄♃♂♀☿☊ 28 Ramaḍān 631 (26 June 1234) ♋12♊24♉17♎1♉6♊28♋26♍21, 1 Shawwāl 631 (29 June 1234) ♋14♋30♉17♎1♉8♋2♌1♍21. The first two tables contain planetary and zodiac names. The table describes the influences of planets when they appear in conflation with zodiac alignments. Abbreviations require deciphering. (Information from Johannes Thomann)

State document, probably. In Arabic script. Dated: Rabīʿ II 425 kharājiyya, which is roughly a year or two prior to 1034 CE. Mentions some sums of dinars and perhaps khuddām. Needs further examination for content. There is a drawing of a boat. On verso there is a Hebrew alphabet and atbash.

Medical treatise in Arabic script. Including a section on diseases of the brain.

Tax receipt, Fatimid, for the sum of 2 dīnārs beginning with a basmala and "waṣl ilā bayt al-māl". Not the usual format; more of a central fiscal hand than a provincial one. Two registration marks: al-ḥamdu lil-lāh wa-bihi nastaʿīn, al-ḥamdu lil-lāh ʿalā niʿamih.

Recipes in Arabic script mentioning lead and fire. Possibly alchemical. Needs further examination.

Medical treatise in Arabic script.

Arabic poetry. With a popular character: it has extremely short verses with dense rhymes: (1) wa-starhabūhā al-ruhbān. . . wa-staqsamū [..] al-ṣulbān. . . (2) yā ṣāḥ ludhdh bi-alwāḥ wa-nhaḍ [...] al-afrāḥ [...] al-mirāḥ [...] al-aqdāḥ. The latter poem is full of conventional love imagery and reminiscent of Yemeni Shabazian poetry (but there is nothing to suggest that this fragment is late or that it has any connection with Yemen or even with Jews). There is also what may be a name of a woman: Ghālī bt. al-Dawālī.

Medical treatise in Arabic script. Faded.

Medical treatise in Arabic script.

Medical text in Arabic script. Instructions on interacting with the patient, it seems.

Islamic prayers/formulae in Arabic script. Not all of the text blocks are easy to read, but at least three begin with "Allāhuma ṣalli ʿalā Muḥammad" and continue with praises for Muḥammad.

Medical treatise in Arabic script.

Medical treatise in Arabic script.

Medical treatise in Arabic script.