Geniza Lab

Letter from Araḥ b. Natan, also known as Musāfir b. Wahb, in Alexandria, to his brother, Avraham b. Natan the seventh, in Cairo. Dating: 1094–1111 CE. Avraham was an associate of the Nagid Mevorakh b. Saadya. In the letter, Araḥ reports of serious riots in Alexandria and a drunken brawl that ended only with the intervention of the chief of police (wālī), although he also accuses the other faction of having alerted the wālī, in addition to the drunken brawl having drawn his attention. The writer praises the local muqaddam who managed to free those involved with the brawl. He also complains of inappropriate fetishization of official decrees, and is so annoyed at the behavior of his fellow Jews that he reports it to the governor, Fakhr al-Mulk. For his brother’s benefit, he adds that the appropriate way to fetishize a decree is, as everyone knows, to kiss it and put it on your eyes, which is what the governor does. But “the Jews,” he complains, “take it around from place to place” and "wave it around like a banner." There is a passing reference to his illness ('I will tell you about it when my spirit recovers from this illness,' v1). It is likely that he is attributing his illness to the events described in the letter (wa-qad lazimanī minhu mulzim), though Frenkel understands this sentence to mean simply that there is some matter that is incumbent on him. (Information from Miriam Frenkel, Alan Elbaum and Marina Rustow)

Subsequent use: Two legal drafts from the court of the Nagid Mevorakh. Fragmentary and incomplete. #1: Beginning of a statement about a brawl between Shelomo b. Avraham (may be the same troublemaker as in T-S 24.74, another brawl document) and Sason b. Natan at the gate of the Dār al-Ṣarf. The two parties were dragged before the qāḍī, the parnas came and said he’d represent one of them and take care of it the following day in the Jewish court, but then an hour later the amir Shahm al-Dawla had the two squabblers and the parnas dragged before the Ṣāhib al-Bāb (possibly even the high Fatimid official also known as al-wazīr al-ṣaghīr). Salāma and Sason reached a settlement and had to pay a brokerage fee (5 dirhams each?). "They also said" that someone had tried to beat Shelomo with a crop (miqraʿa), only for Sason to intervene and grab the crop out of his hand, 'out of fear lest the gentiles intervene between them.' #2: A testament in which a father gives the house in which he lives to his baby daughter Sitt al-Gharb, who was still nursing, with the exclusion of her brothers. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.) ASE

Letter from Avraham al-Tawrīzī to al-Shaykh al-Fakhr al-Skandarī. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: No earlier than 15th century; mentions the currency ashrafī. Catalogued as 16th century. Mentions that Ibn al-Nābulsī arrived. Deals mainly with business matters. Mentions an amir and a duwaydar(?).

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Writer and addressee unknown. Dating: No earlier than 15th century, since it mentions the currency ashrafī. Deals mainly with business matters. Mentions Rashīd. The writer will be accompanying a certain amīr to 'the villages' and to Alexandria. Needs further examination.