Geniza Lab

Letter, referring to the Nagid, a certain Menaḥem, Dammūh, the cloth trade, the death of a woman’s child and the desire of the writer to see Zakkay again, possibly the addressee of the letter. Dated Shabbat ba-Midbar 1651 of the Seleucid Era (= 1340-1341 CE). (Information from CUDL)

Letter from the chancellery of the Nagid Yehoshuaʿ Maimonides (d. 1355) concerning a needy orphan. The first line is in Arabic characters, characteristic of letters from the Nagid's office. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, pp. 303-304)

Letter, possibly from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides, recommending a man who is “poor but from a good family.” The community of Fustat is asked to help by taking up a collection in the synagogue, referred to as a ‘pesiqa.’ (Mark Cohen, The Voice of the Poor in the Middle Ages: An Anthology of Documents from the Cairo Geniza, Princeton University Press, 2005, 197) EMS. Bibliography: Mentioned in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 67–104.

Stern letter from the office of Yehoshuaʿ Maimonides, requesting the addressee’s quick appearance together with money he owes. An Arabic basmala (or perhaps authentication mark, see Yehoshua's other letters to the community) is written over Yehoshuaʿ’s motto. (Information from CUDL.) Bibliography: Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 92.

Letter, possibly from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides, in which the nagid asks the community in Fustat to take up a charity collection for a scholar, David, on his way to Jerusalem and in a hurry to catch a caravan. A note in the margin indicates this request to expedite the collection. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 2:136, 548; and Mark Cohen, The Voice of the Poor in the Middle Ages, 198) EMS. Bibliography: Mentioned in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 67–104.

Official letter from either the office of Yehoshuaʿ Maimonides (r. 1310–55) or his father Avraham II Maimonides (r. 1300–13). (Goitein favors the latter, even though the same clerk wrote many more documents for Yehoshuaʿ.) This was written at the time of the Jewish New Year (usually late September) in which Yehoshuaʿ Nagid commands that a collection 'from the women' be taken up by two women, one of them the wife of the beadle Sulayman. The women are referred to as “house,” from the rabbinic idiom, “his house means his wife.” (Mark Cohen, Voice of the Poor, 196–98.) EMS.

Letter from the office of Yehoshuaʿ Nagid (d. 1355) to the community of Fustat asking them to arrange a charitable collection (Information from Goitein, Tarbiz 54 [1984], 84)

Fragmentary letter from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides to a certain Avraham, concerning the affairs of a man, his wife, and a young boy, and mentioning issues of habitation and an excommunication. See discussion in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 96–97.

Letter of recommendation from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides to be read in "the two synagogues," to help an old man named Yeshuʿa to travel to Jerusalem where his children lived. Bibliography: Mentioned in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 67–104.

Letter of recommendation for a poor man with a family from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides.

Legal document in Arabic script, dated Ṣafar 1334 CE (735 Hijri). Sitt al-ʿAdā confirms to have received from [...] b. Samaw'il b. Rashīd b. Abū Saʿd al-Yahūdī al-ʿAṭṭār for the rent of a store in the Sūq al-Maghāriba 28 dirhams for the month of Muḥarram. Information from Goitein's note card.

Letter from the office of Yehoshuaʿ Maimonides (introduced with his usual motto) to the community in Cairo concerning a lawsuit between Hiba b. Abū l-Faraj Allāh and his in-law Fakhr; he warns against unauthorised recourse to a gentile court. (Information from CUDL)

Order sent to the community of Fustat from the office of Yehoshuaʿ Nagid (d. 1355) recommending the elder Shemuel for charity, followed by requests and prayers on verso written in a different handwriting. (Information from a note on Goitein's typed text)

Fragment of a letter from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides, possibly a recommendation for Yosef al-Ṣabbān (the soap boiler).

Pledges for charity on Sabbath lekh lekha of the year 1647, the third week of the Jewish liturgical year, falling in October 1335 (Goitein). The list is headed by hd (=hadrat, His eminence, normally reserved for the Nagid) the judge Shemuel ha-Kohen, who contributed 20 (dirhams), far more than anyone else. 1 donor pledges 20; 2 pledge 10; 6 pledge 5; 1 pledges 3; 18 pledge 2; 56 pledge 1; 2 pledge 1/2; 4 not indicated; 18 illegible. Total number of contributors 108. Heading: asamu lil....'pledged for the...' looks like a pe followed by the faint remains of a qof, rather than, as Goitein suggests in his annotaton, ללכ]ניס or ללע]ניים. Regarding the date: 'This was in the yea[r] 647 Sel.' (perhaps read 1647, which is 1335/36 C.E., which is much more likely than 647 A.M = 881/82 C.E., but note that the preceding letter looks more like a dalet [= 4000] than an alef). In any event, this notation seems to have been there before the list was written, as proved by the last name on line 10, Sulayman, which had to be squeezed in to avoid the letters in the margin, and by the fact that the note is seemingly in a different hand. If so, the writing in the margin probably has nothing to do with the list and therefore the list is to be dated after the fall of 1335. (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, p. 496, App. C 69 and Cohen.) Also discussed in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 99f.

Letter from the office of Yehoshua the Nagid (d. 1355), a grandson of a grandson of the Rambam, to the Jerusalemite synagogues concerning an erection of a Sukkah and redemption of pawned Torah bells.

Letter of recommendation from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides, to be read in the synagogue, on behalf of a pregnant woman who has no money to support her sick son. ASE. Mentioned in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 67–104.

Letter from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides to a certain Avraham ha-Sar (likely the same addressee as in T-S 8J40.2) regarding an excommunication. Muslim courts are mentioned. Needs further examination.

An agreement between a person and his divorcee, al-Mahalla al-Kubra, 1374.

Letter from the office of the Nagid Yehoshuaʿ Maimonides (d. 1355) in which the cantor Faraj Allāh is ordered to arrange a collection for a traveler. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, p. 494)