Geniza Lab

Letter from Natan b. Avraham, Fustat, to Abu Yusuf Elazar b. Isma'il, Qus, approximately 1035.

Spain This section of a letter to Abū al-Saʿad ha-Levi, that is Ḥalfon, is written in a typical but very eloquent Sephardic script. The letter was short to begin with, and now only a little of its opening and most of what is written in the margins is missing. The writer, whose identity is unknown, scribbled words in Arabic letters inside the Arabic text - The writing is in Hebrew letters. It seems that he wrote everything in a hurry, and it is not always clear whether a certain letter is written in Hebrew letters or in Arabic letters. Because of these difficulties and the poor state of preservation of the letter, the decipherment and translation are provided in several places. The writer also sent blessings in the name of his father. The inscription حضرة المرتبة حرست (ח̇צר̈ה אלמרתב̈ה חרסת, in translation: Darat his majesty, may God preserve it') has not been found in the same language in another place by the hour. 2 (Information from Goitein and Friedman, India Book IV)

Note from a certain Ḥajjāj to Yosef Yiju, in Mazara, Sicily. In Judaeo-Arabic. Informing him about a consignment sent to him by one of his sons. Dating: October–November 1154 CE.

Note from Hajjaj, in Messina, to Yosef Yiju, in Mazara, regarding a consignment sent to Yosef by his sons. Written around October-November 1154.

Upper margin and address from a letter by Abu Nasr b. Avraham, addressed to Abu Zikri Yehudah ha-Kohen b. Yosef ha-Kohen. Mentions a box containing coral and a leather bottle. Also mentions a man with a pockmarked face. Information from Goitein notes linked below.

Legal document. Agreement between Ḥalfon b. Netanel ha-Levi and his partner Abū l-Faraj b. Abū l-Khayr. Location: probably Yemen. Dating: No later than Kislev 1442 Seleucid, which is November/December 1130 CE. Mentions ʿAydhāb. (Information from India Book; Hebrew description below) Probably Yemen; Before Kislev, 1442; November 4 - December 2, 1130

Order of one raṭl of olive oil (zayt ṭayyib) by Abū Zikrī Kohen. (Information from Goitein’s index card.)

Awaiting description - see Goitein notes linked below.

Letter fragment (part of a few lines of recto and verso). Legible phrases include "May God 'write' his health. . . . Forgive me. I already paid. . . . the slave [i.e. the writer] to 'Aydhab." ASE.

Letter from Abū Naṣr b. Avraham, in Alexandria. In Judaeo-Arabic with several lines in Arabic script on verso. Dated: 11 Sivan [4901] AM, which is 18 May 1141 CE. Abū Naṣr informs the addressee that Yehuda ha-Levi set sail on Wednesday, the first day of Shavuʿot, after leaving him a letter for the Nagid Shemuel b. Ḥananya, which accompanies this letter. The Arabic text on verso—which may or may not be related—reads "... he did not accept from him, and he went up with him/it to Cairo and was declared bankrupt. . . to go with them, and he met the Rayyis and told him, and he saved him from them." (Information from CUDL and from Goitein and Friedman, India Book IV.)

Awaiting description - see Goitein notes linked below.

Naba, the son of Abu al-Barakat, the son of Yosef Lebdi, appoints two attorneys to settle his claim over 'sugar, sugar molasses (qatara) and (other) goods'. Friedman identifies the handwriting to be that of Avraham Maimonides. This is important due to the legal terminology in the document. The appointment is carried out not only by the legal transfer of four cubits in the land of Israel, but also through the threshold of the house he inherited from his father. This draft was written in Fustat, before 1237.

Letter from Khalaf b. Yiṣḥaq, in Aden, to Ḥalfon ha-Levi b. Netanel, in Bharuch, India (v14). Dating: ca. 1134 CE. Damaged and missing the ends of the lines. The letter mainly deals with business, much of it in pepper and textiles. It mentions that a ship capsized at the entrance to the city [in fact, the join clarifies that it was a man named Yarbaḥ who drowned] (r15); that Maḍmūn b. Ḥasan did not send any merchandise to Egypt this year [in fact, that he did not sell any pepper this year] (r17–18); various Jewish merchants who reached Aden from Egypt this year, including Abū l-Ḥasan Ibn al-ʿAkkāwī, the son of Ibn al-ʿAfṣī, the son of Sibāʿ, [...] al-Mahdawī, and Ismāʿīl al-Maghribī, who brought good news about relations with the sultan (or government, r22–25); the arrival of two ships from India (r32); and Khalaf's six-month illness, from Tevet to Sivan (v8–10). Greetings are extended to colleagues in al-Qaṣṣ and Bharuch. Information in part from Goitein and Friedman. (Goitein initially identified the addressee as Avraham ben Yijū.) Join by Amir Ashur. ASE. Aden; 1134

Letter from Yosef b. Avraham to Avraham b. Yiju reconstructed from four fragments (the last discovered after the publication of the English edition). The letter was written about a year before IB III, 1, 1136–39. Yosef had a partnership with a young man named Abu al-Faraj b. Musa/Moshe al-Baghdadi. As the investor, Yosef was supposed to receive two thirds of the profit. However, the young man tried to escape from India to Ceylon and from there to another location. Despite this, Yosef is careful not to expose the young man and is willing to provide him with funds to return to Aden, in order to preserve the young man's reputation. The letter also contains various details and instructions regarding Ibn Yiju's and Yosef's commercial dealings. (III, 4 = T-S 10J12.5 III, 5 = T-S NS J181 III, 6 = T-S AS 146.12 III, 6a = T-S AS 149.184)

Letter from an India trader in Quṣ. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Probably end of 11th or early 12th century, based on Goitein's assessment. The writer departed when sick (wajiʿ) and arrived healthy in Qūṣ after a Nile voyage of 14 days. He reports that a tremendous Fatimid treasure had been commandeered by al-Bulyanī (perhaps the head of the tribe which commanded the Qūṣ-ʿAydhāb route). The treasure included 70 slave women, each with a eunuch and jewels and a chest of textiles. See Goitein's attached transcription and correspondence with Claude Cahen.

Receipt issued by Abū Zikrī Kohen to Abū l-Surūr for 3.75 dirhams.

India Book I, 13a: Letter fragment from Yosef b. David Lebdi to Abū ʿAlī Ḥasan b. Bundār, the representative of the merchants in Aden, written in the hand of Hillel b. Eli. The letter deals with the ongoing litigation between Yosef Lebdi and Yequtiʾel (named on recto). The verso contains a sort of summary of the content of the letter. This suggests that this fragment was a draft copy kept in the dossier in Fustat. Friedman proposes that the statement in line 3, 'they sent with me,' suggests that Lebdi carried with him goods sent by at least one other merchants besides Yequtiʾel. The join (T-S AS 153.160) includes the phrase "from Dahlak" in the first line. Joins: Alan Elbaum.

Letter from ʿAllān b. Ḥassūn, Aden, after his return from a difficult voyage to the southern coast of India. Fragment only. Before its second arrival at Kūlam, the ship evidently had two nākhudās on board, 'Alī Nāwak, who disembarked at Fāknūr, and a second nākhudā who subsequently died at sea, and who had evidently been the one responsible for navigation. After his death, the ship remained without a "head" and without charts (as well as something else, which cannot be deciphered due to a lacuna). "We intended, on our way home, to travel to Aden, but riots and bloodshed occurred, and [who]ever was in the town fled. The [shipmas]ter, namely, 'Alī Nāwak, wan[ted] also to flee, but I discovered this ... and I informed [X about it] ...We loaded the textiles and the iron during the night, for he (Nāwak) had the power to keep us back (by refusing to sail). Finally, we all fled to Fāknūr... , where 'Alī Nāwak disembarked and remained, while we went on in the same ship to Kūlam and stayed there for some time. The captain had been ill while still in town, but we sailed for ten days.... God granted us safety, but the captain had a stroke and died. We threw his body overboard into the sea. So the boat remained without a commander and a ..., and we had no charts. After twenty days we arrived in Kūlam ... The ... and the manager came on board and took the ship from us, confirming its rights to its proprietor, being afraid of 'Alī Nāwak. . .. Two captains traveled with us, after they had signed documents (confirming their obligations) towards us, and we set sail." (Information from Goitein and Friedman, India Traders, pp. 127–28) MR

Awaiting description - see Goitein notes linked below.

Mercantile letter in Judaeo-Arabic. The hand is very cursive and very hard to read (and seems familiar from other 11th- or 12th-century mercantile documents). Refers to people such as Abū Saʿīd, possibly Ghālib ibn al-Rayyis, Abū l-Surūr, and al-ʿAkkāwī. Mentions several ships. On verso a list, in the hand of the same scribe, of names and commodities, such as pepper, nard, arsenic, and musk items usually associated with the India trade.