Geniza Lab

Recto/verso: verso

Legal record (#43 and #44). Engagement contract, outline. Dated: Thursday, 14 Sivan 1467 Seleucid. In the hand of Meovrakh b. Natan (like the rest of the notebook). Engagement agreement between a Qaraite man (Abū Saʿīd) and a Rabbanite woman (Sitt al-Naṣr bt. Netan'el ha-Kohen). Goitein suggests that it is an agreement between a husband and wife that was composed after a quarrel (Med. Soc. 3:152–53). But Ashur judges the document to be an engagement agreement because the early marriage payment (muqaddam) is mentioned and there is a condition that the muqaddam will be considered 'a gift', alongside many other conditions common in agreements before the marriage. These conditions include: not to bring into the house anything forbidden by the Rabbanites (ṭā'ifat al-rabbānīn), that the early marriage payment is a gift, that he will not marry a second wife nor take a concubine if she disapproves, on pain of having to pay the delayed marriage payment and giving her a divorce, etc. NB: Goitein and Ashur referred to this document as folio 17 (Firk. II NS 1700.17) in accordance with the foliation written in pen; but the correct folio is 18, as written in pencil (the librarian with the pen gave two folios the number 8). ASE.