Geniza Lab

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Looks late. Goods include: rosewater, walnut, date, raisin, honey, lemon syrup, sugar.

Document in Arabic script. Listing various sums of money in dinars.

Literary text in Hebrew.

Decree. The ends of two lines are preserved. Mentions the cities of [...]nūf and Ṣahrasht (=Ṣahrajt). Reused for a separate document in Arabic script (also on recto) and a literary text in Hebrew (verso).

Letter in Arabic script. The lower ~10 lines are preserved. Faded in places. Some phrases: "...if he is still alive..." (l. 4); "going up to Jerusalem" (ll. 4–5); "the two congregations" (al-jamāʿatān) (l. 7). Ends with a ḥamdala and ṣalwala (prayers for the prophet Muḥammad). Reused for Hebrew piyyuṭ on verso. Needs further examination.

Marriage contract (ketubba). Location: Yūd ʿImrān on Bīr al-Ḥā'it, Yemen. Dated: 4 Nisan 2151 Seleucid, which is 1840 CE. Groom: Hārūn b. Sālim al-Thalā'ī(?). Bride: Saʿda bt. Sālim Ḥoṭer al-Kohen, a widow.

Letter from Mūsā b. Yaʿaqov al-Miṣrī, in Malīj, to Yosef b. David b. Shaʿyā, in Fustat. Dating: ca. 1056 CE. The writer deals with selling and buying goods for the partnership between the two. Mentions several names of people who are involved in their business. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 4, #684) VMR

Business letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Appears to be the handwriting of Yiṣḥaq b. Simḥa Nīsābūrī. Dating: 11th century. Mentions ships from various places including three from al-Mahdiyya and others from al-Andalus. The writer had three successive illnesses over the last month and a half, but he is now better and back to work (al-yawm anā mutaṣarrif), "unless another one comes over me." The writer has sent with Abū l-Ḥasan al-Mazīdī a flask of quince oxymel (sakanjabīn safarjalī) and a "nice" flask containing an unripe-grape rob (rubb ḥiṣrim) and a little quince. Alas, "the ḥiṣrim here is not like the Levantine ḥiṣrim" (cf. T-S 13J23.17, also featuring ḥiṣrim shāmī). Further down, the writer discusses the price of silk.

Business letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Probably 11th century. Possibly the same handwriting as T-S AS 146.206. Content difficult to understand without a join. Mentions Mūsā al-Maghribī.

Letter addressed to the brothers Shemuel and Yehuda. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Probably no earlier than 14th century. Includes the curious information that "all the goods are in the hands of the Franks." Needs further examination.

Table of names and numbers. In Judaeo-Arabic. Late.

Business letter in Judaeo-Arabic. This is a sizeable fragment, but little specific information is preserved. Mentions a certain Maḥāsin and an Amīn al-Dawla.

Legal document. Power of attorney. Dated: November 1050. Location: Fustat. An unsigned assignment of power of attorney from Eleazar Manṣūr ("Head of the Congregations") b. Menaḥem of Aleppo to Hillel b. Avraham. Eleazar waives all right to the claim that Hillel subverted his agency, suggesting this is an unlimited power of attorney. Although documents granting unlimited power of attorney are typically granted to agents effecting marriage, this document reveals Eleazar to have been appointed to collect on an inheritance claim advanced by one Mulūk bt. Neḥuma b. Wahab, a claim described in T-S 18J2.12 (PGPID 3527) wherein Mulūk explains that her inheritance was left by her father’s wife with Tamīm; in this document, Eleazar appoints Hillel to collect Mulūk’s inheritance from "…any person at all, among them… Tamīm…" (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture", 86-87)

List or account, business, Judaeo-Arabic

Report or petition fragment, addressed to a higher state official regarding the matters in southern Upper Egypt, contains the taqbīl clause towards the end. The writer thanks the addressee for his benefactions and reports on a specific group of people who were consumed by greed and hence lost their decency. Mentions bāb al-Ṭāhir al-Nabawī, probably the Caliph himself, and reports that no traveler passed through the gates of southern Upper Egypt. The Hebrew in the lower right margin is a continuation of the text on verso, which is one of the prayers for Yom Kippur (the Vidui specifically).

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic and in Arabic script. Dating: 12th century. Featuring Abū ʿAlī Yeḥezqel Al-Dimyāṭī, the brother of Ḥalfon b. Netanel, as well as Khalaf al-ʿAdanī.

Legal deed. In Hebrew. Location: Fustat. Dated: Beginning of Heshvan, 5488 AM, which is 1727 CE. Involving the qodesh of the mustaʿrib congregation and real estate. Sums are given in diwani muayyadis/medins. Needs further examination.

Legal deed. In Hebrew. Location: Fustat. Dated: End of Heshvan, 5562 AM, which is 1801 CE. Me'ir b. Naʿim invests 100 reales (1 real = 90 medins) with Raḥamaim Tājirī and his wife Mazal.

Accounts (state?) in Arabic script. Reused for Hebrew piyyuṭ on verso.

Halakhic discussion in Judaeo-Arabic. Possibly literary, possibly a responsum