Geniza Lab

Informal note in Judaeo-Arabic. Concerning 'the arrival of the pieces (? qiṭaʿ).' The writer takes a snippy tone: "Please have the good grace to send them quickly, because when I must maintain (? aḥfaẓ) something urgently, I am not a person who wants to wait a long time for it to be maintained (? yanḥafiẓ) by our sins or worse." There are some cryptic headers. One of them is Exodus 1:17 about the midwives fearing God. Perhaps this is meant to allude to Exodus 1:21 about God making the midwives houses, and the desired 'pieces' are intended for a house?

Legal document in Judaeo-Arabic. Draft, with extensive corrections. This document is long, rich, and damaged. Dating: Perhaps c.1100, based on the appearance of Yiṣḥaq al-Nafūsī; but see the identification tab on FGP for further possible identifications of other people mentioned. Recto is a declaration/testimony in the first person. It opens with a reference to a group of captives, perhaps in Tyre (line 3), who managed to redeem themselves. The narrator donated 20 dinars, and the freed captives were able to travel to Fustat. The original text and the corrected text contain slightly divergent stories, but it seems the narrator gave a second payment of 15 dinars and a third payment of 12 dinars to a specific man (likely Yaʿaqov) and to his mother (the scribe drew up the document with few references to the mother, then subsequently added her into the story). At this point, Sar Shalom b. Ḥiyya and Yiṣḥaq al-Nafūsī arrived in Fustat and reported that Yaʿaqov was thriving and enjoyed the favor of (had 'ittiṣāl' with) Yehosef Nagid ha-Gola. A shipment of valuable Socotrene aloe now enters the story—Yaʿaqov might have asked the narrator to sell it and send him the money because his mother needed it. The narrator might have objected, citing some terms of the 'tadhkira' that he had with him. The story becomes difficult to follow around here -- it is possible that Yaʿaqov has been embezzling the funds that everyone (the narrator, Yaḥyā ha-Zaqen al-Fāsī b. Avraham, and Yīṣḥaq al-Nafūsī b. Ḥalfon) has been sending him to support his mother (a total of 47 dinars), and now they are demanding confirmation that she has received the money and a release from further obligations. There is a note underneath in smaller text that may contain the findings of the judicial investigation: how much money Yaʿaqov's mother received, how much money Yaʿaqov still owes her, and a confirmation that he has handed over the rest. Someone (Yaʿaqov?) may be called al-Muqaddasī here. The portion of the document on verso is the confirmation that Yaʿaqov's mother has now received all the money, and therefore all parties are now released from further obligations. This reading is tentative, and the document awaits transcription and more definitive study. ASE

Letter or official report in Arabic script, beautifully written From Ṣādiq b. Hibatallāh. Addressed to a qāḍī. Wide space between the lines on recto, narrow space between the lines on verso (perhaps these are two separate documents?). The text on verso refers to al-ḥabs, majlis al-wālī, an annual payment of 1 dinar (line 11), al-aḥbās (line 21). Needs examination.

Letter from Simḥūn b. Dāwūd ibn al-Siqillī (Qayrawān) to Yosef b. Yaʿaqov b. ʿAwkal (Fustat). The letter deals with a conflict between the sender and the recipient over a consignment of brazilwood, which Simḥūn b. Daʿūd sent to Spain against the instructions of Yosef b. ʿAwkal. This caused a delay in payments and a break of contact between the two. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 2, p. 644.)

Letter from Simḥūn b. Dāwūd ibn al-Siqillī (Qayrawān) to Yosef b. Yaʿaqov b. ʿAwkal (Fustat). The letter deals with a conflict between the sender and the recipient over a consignment of brazilwood, which Simḥūn b. Daʿūd sent to Spain against the instructions of Yosef b. ʿAwkal. This caused a delay in payments and a break of contact between the two. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 2, p. 644.)

Letter from Jerusalem from the middle of the 11th century, with a document from the Egyptian office of treasurer on the free space on the back. (Gil: Letter from Ḥayyim ha-ḥaver b. Shelomo/Salāma in Jerusalem to Yiṣḥaq b. Yiṣḥaq he-ḥaver in Fustat regarding a debt owed to the latter. On verso, accounts of very large amounts of money in the hand of Barhūn b. Mūsā al-Tāhirtī, the cousin of Nahray b. Nissim. Ed. Gil, Palestine vol. 3, #463.) (NB: The Goitein material scanned here covers DK 2, DK 333 and DK 11. MR)

Liturgical.

Genealogy lists for the families of Ibn al-Shavuy ('son of the captive') and the in-law of Nuṣayr. In the first family there is someone named Netanel Ne'eman ha-Malkhut.

Document in Arabic script. Needs examination.

Letter from Bayān to his 'father' Abū l-Fakhr. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Probably 12th or 13th century. The sender reminds the addressee that he had promised to pay Abū Saʿd the money owed, paying a portion with Bayān's money and dealing with the rest himself. But Abū Saʿd sent Bayān a letter complaining that he has only received 30 nuqra dirhams. The lower part of the document is missing. On verso there is the Friday night kiddush in calligraphic Hebrew.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. The sender is probably Maḥrūz b. Yaʿaqov, an India trader and shipowner (nākhudā) known from documents dating from 1131/32 to c.1150 CE. (This identification was made by Amir Ashur and Mordechai Akiva Friedman.) The sender was previously in Qūṣ and is now in some town in the Egyptian Rīf or the Levant, as he asks for news about shipments for him from Aden. On this fragment, the lower part of recto and the upper part of verso are preserved. The sender complains about how the wālī squeezed money out of him this year for paying half of Hiba's capitation tax. He reports that a Maghribī arrived from Damascus, and the community contracted with him to teach their children and lead their prayers for one year, and they will pay him 9 qirṭāses(?) and two fulūs monthly and perhaps 2 dirhams toward his capitation tax. The sender quotes Avot 4:9 ('whoever fulfills the Torah in poverty will ultimately fulfill it in prosperity'). The sender is very pleased about the addressee's apology and gift (of 20 dirhams?) and reiterates that he didn't have to do that. The sender is abashed to send letters to his cousins (abnā' khāla) because he doesn't have any gifts to send them. In the margin of recto there is a request for something (קרכה?) made of white flax (here there seems to be a Judaeo-Persian word, bābat, used in a similar context as in T-S 8J19.28 -- see Shaked's article on Persian-Arabic Bilingualism in From a Sacred Source). The bulk of the text on verso is taken up with the shipment of cloves that never reached the sender. This may be the fault of a certain Sulaymān and the sender seems intimidated by him ('no one sues him except God'?). It may be deposited with the untrustworthy children of Abū Saʿd. The addressee is asked to help. The sender complains that no one will lend him money or borrow money from him. He asks the addressee to put in a good word with the latter's cousin (ibn ʿamm), 'who knows the Levant well.' The sender claims that he can turn dirhams into dinars. He asks for a scroll on parchment (gevil) and the laws of slaughter in Arabic (as the addressee had promised), and he wants the addressee to sell a volume of the Torah for him. The last preserved line of the letter (verso margin) mentions the Levant and yarn and sal ammoniac and "the saliva of m[...]." ASE

List of valuable items in Judaeo-Arabic. Headed "thabat mā fīhā." Items include: a maqṭāʿ cloth of fine mulḥam; a cushion; two sewn thawbs; a mayzar cover and a mayzar cover of wool; an ebony inkpot; a tablecover (sufra); a knife; and a pair of wax candle lamps.

Accounts in Arabic script. Contributors list? It is a list of names, each of which has the word "dīnār" next to it, and another word underneath that. (One of the words underneath dīnār may be 'wariq.') The names: ʿAlī b. Rasīq(?); Ḥasan b. Rasīq(?); Musāfir b. Ḥasan; Ḥasan b. Ibrāhīm; ʿAlī b. Salmūn; Ḥasan b. Faḍl; ʿAlwān b. Hamza; Muḥsin b. Ḥasan; Mufarraj(?) b. Futūḥ; Naṣr al-Dīn b. Ḥamāma(?); ʿAlī b. Aḥmad; ʿAlī b. ʿAṭṭiyya; Qāsim b. Khalīfa; Salāma(?) b. Futūḥ. There is also a list in Judaeo-Arabic (see separate record).

There are 32 folios sharing this shelfmark. See individual PGPIDs for more information. Most of it consists of a notebook, probably belonging to a Byzantine merchant, filled with records of various transactions. The language is primarily Hebrew but the months are Julian (אפריל ,דסמבר etc.). Many business partners are named, at least some of whom have Greek names (e.g. Manolis on folio 5). There is a calendar for the year 1430/31 CE (folio 26), written in an interesting ink that has faded to pale silver; the page now looks blank at a glance, but much of the text is legible. There are accounts (folios 1 and 15) with a Hebrew grammatical structure (X של Y) but in which nearly all of the nouns are in a different language, presumably Greek in Hebrew characters, but needs examination by an expert. There are several letters, including folios 2, 9, 11, 16, 17, 21, and 23. The letter on folio 11 is a join with DK 371. The letters on folios 16 and 23 are both addressed to an Avraham b. Yosef ha-Levi. The former at least is signed by a Shabbetay who also gives the name of his city (קרישטו = Karystos, probably). Shabbetay says that he does not spend much time in אגריפון (Negroponte/Chalcis, the capital of Euboea). Another letter (folio 17) mentions "קדיאה," probably =קנדיאה, which would be Crete. Underneath the letter on folio 2 are two lines of Greek in Greek characters.This page, incidentally, is a palimpsest, with a Hebrew-looking subtext. Folio 29 may contain very faded Greek text (in Greek characters) as well. Additionally, there are leaves from the Talmud apparently in a 14th-century Byzantine hand (e.g. folios 6 and 32) and leaves from a book of seliḥot (e.g. folio 31). Information partly from FGP. Merits deeper examination. ASE

Notebook, probably belonging to a 15th-century Byzantine merchant, filled with records of various transactions. The language is primarily Hebrew but the months are Julian (אפריל ,דסמבר etc.). Many business partners are named, at least some of whom have Greek names (e.g. Manolis on folio 5). The accounts may include Judaeo-Greek on folios 1 and 15. See folio 26 for the probable dating.

Literary, probably. Very faded. See folio 26 for the probable dating.

Letter in Hebrew. Needs examination. See folio 26 for the probable dating.

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