Geniza Lab

Legal testimony. In Arabic script. Dated: 26 Jumādā II 1205 AH, which is 1791 CE. Involves Mīkhāʾīl Nāyūtī(?) al-Kātib(?) and Yaʿqūb Ḥarrāf(?). There are four witness signatures at the bottom as well as an inscription and a stamped seal in the right margin. (Information in part from JRL catalogue.) Needs examination.

Legal document in Arabic script. Dated: 1248 AH, which is 1832/33 CE.

Document in Arabic script. Late. Needs examination.

Small fragment in Arabic script, possibly literary. Stamped with a particularly ornate seal that may be legible. Ottoman-era.

Legal or official document. In Arabic script. Dated: Shaʿbān 1240 AH, which is 1825 CE. (But note that the year 1241 appears at the bottom and the year 1242 on verso.) Appears to be a receipt for a sum collected 'from all of the households... from the heads of the (Jewish) sects in al-Maḥrūsa (Fustat/Cairo).' The name Yosef Gershon (يوصف قرشون/יוסף גירשון) appears, and he may be identified as the head of the Jewish sect (shaykh ṭāʾifat al-yahūd). There is a stamped seal at the bottom that may be legible. (Information in part from JRL catalogue.)

Debenture bond / promissory note (ورقة سند). An adorned printed template states that this is "a debenture bond for the sum of less than 100 piaster (qirsh)," continued on the left side: "its value [is] 10 silver." Dated: 1264 AH, which is 1847/48 CE. Further information added in hand-writing: just beneath the title the equivalent of the sum in French (?) currency first in numerals: 62 ½ (?), and then in words. The signature of al-Ḥājj Ibrāhīm Khalīl appears at the end, next to a stamp. (Information from JRL catalogue.)

Two legal documents concerning the same case. The first is a Muslim legal query together with the ruling/fatwā, in Arabic script. The second is a Jewish court record, in Judaeo-Arabic. Dated: [12]48 AH, which is 1832/33 CE. The legal query reads, "A Jewish woman died, and some man came and demanded a bribe from her husband and brother "as is their custom" (ʿalā ʿādatihim)" The ruling of the jurist Aḥmad al-Tamīmī al-Khalīlī al-Ḥanafī: the bribe is invalid and the husband and brother can demand their money back. The Jewish court record reports that Yiṣḥaq Levi came with a messenger from the Muslim court, presented the fatwā, and demanded a reimbursement from the community for the burial expenses for his wife. The community pays up, and Yiṣḥaq releases them from further claims. The viewpoints in the 2 documents are strikingly opposed. The Ḥanafī court apparently objects to an administrative practice within the Jewish community ("he took a bribe as is their custom"). In the Judaeo-Arabic document, Yiṣḥaq is the one presented as extorting the community with an unjust demand. There are two official seals on this document, the first belonging to the Muslim authority (Aḥmad al-Tamīmī al-Ḥanafī), the second belonging to the Jewish authority (Gabriel Yisrael). MCD. ASE.

Document in Arabic script from the year 1823/4 CE (1239). Needs further examination.

Some sort of receipt or legal documentation in Arabic. Late. Mentions a building and various sums of money and bears a seal.

Letter from a man, in Damascus, to his father, perhaps in Fustat. The sender expresses his longing and desperation in this foreign land, especially after the departure of Manṣūr ("the world closed itself in on me... I cry... and wish my soul would leave, but it does not"). He reports that he is revered, because he has successfully humiliated all the competing cantors, and now nobody dares to chant in his presence. (The father seems to be a cantor as well.) His father was upset that he entered the service of "someone like the ghulām"; Manṣūr will explain everything when he arrives. He was unable to send some of the goods for his brother; Ibn Abū l-Zakkār may have told him not to trust a potential bearer. He has sent with Manṣūr a mould of cheese worth 2.5 dirhams, and he has equipped Manṣūr with funds to keep the cheese well-oiled en route lest it dry out. He complains about the lack of sustenance in Damascus. He claims to fast most days out of sorrow/longing, and he repeatedly asks for prayers. He is worried that his enemies will gain the upper hand over him (he may have seen this in a dream? Verso, line 8). He describes the hospitality of his paternal uncles and their children and his maternal aunt. He asks for news of potential fiancees back home—his cousin (bint ʿamm) and Nabaʾ—since the locals in Damascus are trying to set him up with a local woman. He emphasizes that he would never get married with his father absent. He alludes to a period of a year when he had a falling-out with his father, a rift which is now healed (this may explain some of the over-the-top language of longing in this letter). He asks for some aqwāl, which should be sent to the house of the Nezer along with instructions to forward them to Aleppo should the son have traveled already. He concludes by warning his father to seal all of his future letters—"and not with a heavy seal." (Information in part from CUDL.) ASE

Letter fragment from Seʿadya Abū Saʿd to Shelomo (Sulaymān) אבוסטרה(?). In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Late, probably no earlier than 15th century. Most of the content of the letter is torn off and missing, but at least one other name (Aharon רשורה?) is preserved. The writer's name is given both in the letter itself and in the seal imprint at the top.

Perhaps three letters of recommendation for Yaʿaqov b. Yehuda. The first was written in Istanbul and signed by Nissim Yaʿaqov [...]. The second is difficult to read; the writer's name may be Gavriel. The third was written by Hayyim David Hazzan, the Hakham Bashi of Jerusalem, 1861–69. His large blue seal in Arabic, Hebrew, and Latin characters is preserved next to his signature. Underneath one of the other two entries (it seems the second one) is a different Hakham Bashi seal in Arabic and Hebrew characters. The date is 1864 according to the Worman catalog. ASE.

Document in Arabic script. Appears to be dated 28 Rajab 123[.] = 1814–24 CE. Needs examination.

Legal document or receipt or a similarly formal document. In Arabic script. Dated: 17 Rabīʿ al-Thānī 1013 AH, which is September 1604 CE. Signed: Ibrāhīm [...].

Letter from Muḥammad Jāwīsh(?). In Arabic script. Dating: Ottoman era. Asking the addressee (al-ʿāmil bi-Miṣr al-Qadīma?) to return the burda(?) that he took from ʿAṭiyya and asking the amir to send approximately 20 heads of sheep (ghanam).