Geniza Lab

It is unclear which shelfmark is meant. The only current shelfmark that might be documentary is M53 (alt: 19), which does not have images on FGP. (But M53 is literary text of הלכות הרי"ף according to DK catalogue prepared by Dr. Ezra Scwat. M=missing, so there is no photo around. AA) If XIX is intended, see instead DK 230.3 (alt: XIX) or DK 228.3 (alt: 228/B, XIX).

Circular letter from Maṣliaḥ Gaon to all the communities of the Rīf.

Letter from Maṣliaḥ Gaon to Aharon ha-Sar b. Netan'el. Opens with Maṣliaḥ's genealogy: Maṣliaḥ ha-Kohen b. Shelomo b. Eliyyahu b. Shelomo (thus far all are titled Rosh Yeshivat Ge'on Yaʿaqov) b. Yehosef ha-Kohen Bayt Din Kohen Ṣedeq b. Aharon. Maṣliaḥ writes that he has sent his emissary Yefet ha-Levi and asks the addressee to assist him in his mission. Dated: Iyyar 1443 Seleucid, which is 1132 CE. The transcription available on FGP does not entirely correspond to the images available. The FGP transcription is for a circular letter by Maṣliaḥ Gaon sent to all the cities of the Rīf. This text may have come from part of the letter that was not digitized.

The first folio (including the title page) of Kitāb al-Fityān, a lost book by al-Jāḥiẓ. The little that is preserved here enumerates the qualities and manners of a proper fatā, a proper sāqī, and a proper nadīm. Note that the text is not entirely new. A portion appears also in Kitāb al-Bukhalā' (see Kevin Blankinship "Giggers, Greeners, Peyserts, and Palliards: Rendering Slang in al-Bukhalāʾ of al-Jāḥiẓ, p. 29"). This fragment has been edited by Regourd in her catalogue of the Arabic-script manuscripts in DK.

Business letter in Arabic script from the circle of Nahray b. Nissim, in Arabic script. Mentions the arrival of a certain Salmān, mentions al-Ashmunayn, Abū Yaʿqūb al-Ḥarīrī. Fragmentary and difficult to read.

Accounts for wine production, submitted by Shelomo b. Eliyyahu to his father Eliyyahu the Judge. Similar to T-S Ar.18(1).127. This document is for the month of Av (year not specified), while T-S Ar.18(1).127 is for the month of Tishrei 1230 CE.

Letter of extremely elaborate flattery and good wishes for Purim addressed to a Jewish dignitary (rayyis al-ru'asā). There are a few lines of Hebrew, then the rest (two folios) is in Judaeo-Arabic. Mentions the mighty sultan and the amir Jamāl al-Dīn.

Letter to R. Yaʿaqov b. Moshe. Writer unknown.

Legal fragment. Damaged and in need of conservation. There is probably additional text (including the year) hidden in the middle where the paper has accordioned. The document involves Abū l-Munā. The witnesses include Hiba b. Naṭira and ʿAllūn b. Khalaf.

Accounts of a druggist. In Arabic script. Items include tamarind, various pastilles (aqrāṣ), chebulic myrobalan (kābulī).

Document in Arabic script. Needs examination.

Letter (or petition or report) in Arabic script. Mainly the formulaic beginning is preserved with the sender's prayers for the addressee's longevity.

Spell book in Judaeo-Arabic.

Letter in Arabic script. Addressed to [...] al-Malikī al-Nāṣirī. Dating: Probably Mamluk era. Needs examination for content. 'warada l-musharraf al-karīm al-ṣādir ʿan al-majlis al-ʿāl... wa-ʿalima jamīʿ ma sharaḥahu wa-ammā mā dhakarahu bi-sabab al-bighāl...'

Letter from Natan b. Nahray, the uncle of Nahray b. Nissim, in Alexandria, to Nahray's son, Abū Saʿd Nissim b. Nahray, in Fustat, ca. 1066. The letter relates many commercial matters and mentions Avraham al-Derʿi as Natan's commercial competitor in coral trade. From Nahray's title and from the fact that Nissim is already grown up and involved in trade, one can conclude that the letter was written in the late nineties of the 11th century. Doc. #43 in Nahray's archive. Mentions various goods: silk, clothes, pearls, lapiz lazuli and tin (Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 3, p. 439).

Fragment of a large letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Referring inter alia to a Nile voyage in the entourage of al-Malik al-Afḍal (1095–1121). Excerpts from recto: "...send it with whomever is available, and I will pay him the price of two nights of [...].... The only reason I did not send the saddle and the reins was fear that you would not be happy with that... I hired a donkey (with) a driver from Qalyūb nearly to Shaṭnūf, to the place of the noble barges (al-ʿushāriyāt //al-saʿīda//), and we went down and stayed several days, and we encountered terrible frights on the Nile. When we arrived in Manūf, the king (al-mālik) //may God make his reign eternal// embarked, along with my master (mawlāya) as well as my master Abū l-Mufaḍḍal, and they traveled to al-Maḥalla. I stayed in the barge, and a murshid(?) stayed with me, and there was nobody to send a letter with, which is the reason for the cutting off of my letters. The day that my master arrived from al-Maḥalla, I wrote a letter and sent it with Salāma al-Shīrajī, and it was concise... because I did not have enough time...." The continuation of recto deals with trade in clothing and textiles. The letter resumes on verso as follows: "We entered Alexandria.... Abū l-Mufaḍḍal took back (? istaʿāra) his seal/decree (?? sijill) and gave me a female donkey and informed me what happened with the Frankish female slave...." Then mentions purple cloth (urjuwān) and the merchant Abū l-Afrāḥ. In a postscript, "I was informed about the deliverance of Abu Saʿīd's wife, praise be to God for this. As to the girl's death, nothing can be done about it. May God soon give them a male child instead. Congratulate them all on her deliverance" (Med Soc III, p. 228 note 26). ASE. NB: Goitein's attached transcription belongs to another fragment.

Letter by Raḥamim b. Nissim to ʿArūs b. Yosef about dealing in purple and indigo.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic from Mūsā b. Muwaffaq primarily to his son Yehuda, but also to a certain Abū Sulaymān, telling him to come visit his sister. He sends regards to a large number of people. There is an addendum or draft of a different letter or petition in Arabic script (from "Mūsā the Jew," presumably the same man who wrote the Judaeo-Arabic letter). Dating: Probably Mamluk-era, based on handwriting, formulae, and layout. Needs further examination. NB: The metadata and transcription in FGP belong to a different shelfmark, Gil, Kingdom, IV, #430, which, at the time Gil saw it, used to have the shelfmark DK 228 d-e. The current shelfmark for that fragment will take some work to figure out.

Letter from Maymūn b. Khalfa, Palermo, to Nahray b. Nissim, Fustat. 18 August 1056 (Gil). Describes the movement of goods and ships to and from Sicily. The government of Sicily imposed on Jewish merchants in Palermo a customs import duty (ʿushr), normally imposed only on foreign merchants, because resident Jews cooperated with their foreign partners and declared incoming goods as their property. A judge and other Jews were sent to prison. The writer reproaches Nahray for his dealings with a resident of the island, Sulaymān b. Shaʾul. Also mentions "the ships (plural!) of Abū ʿAbdallah Ibn al-Baʿbāʿ:

Detailed, beautifully written letter of a silkweaver, Abū Saʿd b. Avraham, to his cousin (ibn ʿamm) Ṣedaqa b. Ṣemaḥ, asking for instructions as to the pattern wished for the garments ordered, and many other details. The yarn sent to the writer through one Nāṣir was entangled (mukabbal) and had to be put into order (ḥll); he had not woven the garment ordered, because no clear instructions had been given with regard to the pattern (numūdhaj); a later message, delivered by one Ṣedaqa—of course different from the receiver of the letter said 'yurīduhu bisakākīn,' 'he wishes the pattern with knives,' an instruction which seemed to the writer insufficient. As usual, the manufacturer also trades with finished products. He offers good sūsiyāt and local arḍīs (pl. arāḍī) of utmost thinness (margin l.2) but not of the pattern alluded to. Information from Goitein's notes (to be found with those attached to PGPID 6565). For additional documents involving Ṣedaqa b. Ṣemaḥ (unless there were two), see: Bodl. MS heb. b 11/3, Bodl. MS heb. d 66/96, ENA NS 21.9, T-S 8J33.11, T-S 10J6.11 (ed. Weiss, "Ḥalfon," #138), T-S 13J18.4, T-S 18J1.21, T-S 8.125, T-S 8.131, T-S 28.17 (ed. Ackerman-Lieberman, "Partnership Culture," #56) where we find Ṣedaqa b. Ṣemaḥ b. Dāwud al-Raqqī and, perhaps, T-S 13J17.8, which is addressed to Abū l-Khayr Ṣedaqa b. Ṣammūḥ b. Sason. Information from Oded Zinger's dissertation, p. 166, notes 119–23. ASE.