Geniza Lab

Letter fragment addressed to the dignitary Abū Isḥāq Ibrāhīm b. Isḥāq Ibn al-Furāt (aka Avraham b. Yiṣḥaq ha-Kohen), sent either to or from al-Ramla. Only the first two lines (in Hebrew) and the address (in Arabic script) are preserved. Dating: ca. mid-11th century.

Letter from an unknown man, in Damietta, to his mother, probably in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic with the address in Arabic script. Dating: Perhaps 13th–15th century. The writer assures her that he is doing even better in Damietta than he was in Fustat. He sends regards to numerous family members. He discusses payments for the capitation tax. There are several interesting colloquial forms, including: טציקי for תציקי; the phrase "māshī l-ḥal" for "it's going well" still used in modern Arabic; אלך (ilik) for אליך (ilayki); and אלסלים for אלסלאם.

Letter from Abūn b. Ṣadaqa, in Jerusalem, to Nahray b. Nissim, probably in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic with the address in Arabic script. Asks Nahray to convey his gratitude to someone; mentions the arrival of R. Natan. Needs further examination

Fragment of a deferential letter in Judaeo-Arabic preserving only the beginning and the address in Arabic script. The writer seems to be Abū l-Ḥasan and the addressee may be named Abū l-Faḍl al-[. . .].

Fragment of a letter from Abū l-Faḍl to [.........] al-Shāmī. The addressee's name is given both in Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic but is very faded. The Arabic may say Abū Kathīr (?) . . . b. Sulaymān al-Shāmī. Dated Nov/Dec 1139 CE (Rabīʿ al-Thānī 534). The writer sends regards to al-Shaykh Shemuel and Sitt al-Yumn and Sitt al-Gharb. ASE.

Fragment of a Judaeo-Arabic letter to Nahray b. Nissim (address in Arabic)

Letter fragment sent from Jerusalem. The body is in Judaeo-Arabic and the address is in Arabic script. Dating: Possibly 11th century, based on the hand and overall appearance. Little of the content remains.

Letter, possibly. Recto is in Hebrew script and verso may be the address in Arabic script: Ibrāhīm [...].

Letter from Shelomo b. Yehuda to Avraham b. Sahlan, Fustat, ca 1030. Address on verso in Arabic and Hebrew. (Information from CUDL)

Letter from Shelomo b. Yehuda, Ramla, to Efrayim b. Shemarya (=Abū Kathīr Efrāyim b. Maḥfūẓ), Fustat. Dating: 1040 (after Kislev). It is about a father who is constantly "complaining" (קובל בכל עת) to Shelomo b. Yehuda about his daughter, an aguna, who is constantly "screaming" (צועקת בכל עת) to be released from her condition. See Zinger's dissertation, pp. 319, 322.

Fragment of a business letter in Judaeo-Arabic to Abū Isḥāq Ibrāhīm (?), mentioning someone who died in Balad al-Rūm and licorice (sūs). The handwriting is distinctive, probably known.

Letter to Abū l-Faraj [...] Yaʿaqov b. David, Fusṭāṭ. In a calligraphic Hebrew opening with a poem. Fragment of the beginning. The address on verso is in Arabic.

Fragment of a letter from Abū l-Thanāʾ to his "father," possibly named Abū Saʿd Ibn [...]. In Judaeo-Arabic, with the address in Arabic script (note that the bottom line of the address was originally the top line; it appears where it is now because of how the letter was glued shut and cut open). Dating: Probably late 12th or 13th century, based on handwriting. The sender says that the holiday was no holiday at all due to the addressee's absence. He reports that there is no longer any need (wajh, spelled וש) for the addressee to stay away (fī bilād al-ghurba), because the diwan has received in full (istawfā) whatever was owed to it (the capitation tax?), and "al-Ḥazzāzī has taken for us its writ/document (or even receipt? ḥujja)." Join by Amir Ashur.

Letter from Yaʿaqov b. Salmān al-Ḥarīrī, in Alexandria, to his mother and father, in Qayrawān. Dating: ca. 1050 CE. The address bears the name of the writer's father Salmān b. Ibrāhīm, whom Yaʿaqov addresses at the end of the letter, but he addresses his mother for the bulk of the letter. The writer expresses his disappointment in the Maghrebis in Egypt, who did not assist him as he expected when he was newly arrived in Fustat and very ill for one month. He recovered and is now healthier than ever. When he returned to Abū l-Faraj Ibn ʿAllān who had previously promised to employ him, he found that Abū l-Faraj had lost his mother and his sister, "and was too preoccupied for me" (ishtaghala ʿannī). Yaʿaqov set out on his own and started to trade flaxes. He is planning to travel to the north, perhaps to al-Lādhiqiyya (a plan he carried out: see CUL Or.1080 J17, which he wrote from Tripoli, and T-S 8J19.27, which he wrote from Ramla). But he will wait in Alexandria until he learns what his family thinks of this plan, and he will follow their counsel. The end of the letter has the curious line, "Abū Yaḥyā is well, in complete health, and aṣḥābunā are in complete health, no one died except Abū l-Khayr b. Barukh in Tinnīs" (verso, lines 22–23)—which, along with the illness of Yaʿaqov and the deaths in Abū l-Faraj's family, suggests that there was then an epidemic. Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 4, #661. See also ENA 2738.34, a very similar letter which Yaʿaqov wrote at the same time and addressed to his sister. VMR. ASE.

Letter fragment. In Judaeo-Arabic with the address in Arabic script. Probably 11th-century mercantile.

Letter from the Jewish community of [Minyat] al-Qā'id (?) to a certain Abū Isḥāq (?). In Hebrew and Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment only.

Letter from someone calling himself Ra's al-Kull (in the address) to somebody in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment. Needs examination.

Letter in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe to his brother Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic, with the address in both Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic script. Fragment (upper left corner of recto). He confirms receipt of the previous letter which mentioned that Ḥakam had a dabīqī item and its cushions (mikhāddhā) and that he wished to have them cut (? qaṣārathum) — cf. Moss. II,123.1.2. Ḥakam said that he would send something to Dimyāṭ (Damietta). Regards to Abū Manṣūr Ibn Qasāsa. There is a needle piercing at the center of the top of the page. (Information in part from CUDL.)

Enigmatic fragment of a letter in Judaeo-Arabic describing what happened to the writer in front of the addressee's house; how people were appealing for help on account of the capitation tax; how the writer has lost 25 dirhams; and how there is 'ḥamas' in the country. Also, Abū l-Ḥasan has asked the writer for clay and/or bricks. Verso contains several crossed-out lines and the address in Arabic: to Fustat, to Manṣūr b. al-Ḥazzān (?) al-[. . .] from his brother Abū Saʿd.

Letter from Shemuel b. Ibrahīm, in Fustat, to his father Abū Isḥāq Ibrahīm b. Shabbetay (aka Shubbāṭ), in Palermo. Fragment: upper part of the letter only. In Judaeo-Arabic, with the address in both Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic. Dating: Early 11th century, by Gil's estimate. He suggests that this family may be connected to Benei Sunbāṭ, the family of Sahlān b. Avraham. Contents: Shemuel conveys everyone's worry on account of the addressee, as they have received no news ever since the father's departure from Alexandria. Shemuel then conveys the news of his sister al-Turfa, who is very ill. "She came down with a terrible illness (wajaʿ) at the beginning of Marḥeshvan, which lasted two months, and the illness culminated in a stomach abscess (? dubayla 'alā ra's fu'ādhā). There was not a doctor in Fustat that we did not bring to see her or a single medicine or syrup that we did not give her to drink. After this, terrible fainting fits (ghashw, probably = ghashwa) came over her. We asked her, having despaired of her, saying, "What do you want? What do you desire?" And she said, crying, "By God, there is no desire (shahwa) in my heart and no........ [the fragment ends here]." Gil suggests that her statement should be connected to the writer's expression of longing for the father, something like, "there is no desire in my heart except to see you." (Information in part from Mediterranean Society, I, pp. 304, 476; III, pp. 241, 479,and Goitein's index cards.) The significance of 'dubayla' is ambiguous not only here but also in the medieval Islamic medical literature: see the thorough discussion in Alvarez-Millan, “Disease in Tenth-Century Iran and Irak according to al-Razi’s Casebook”, Suhayl 14 (2015), pp. 69f. Also ambiguous is whether 'ra's al-fu'ād' refers to the stomach or rather to the skin overlying the heart (as it does in al-Razi's casebook). See CUL Or.1080 J24 for another account of a woman with a prolonged illness who developed fainting fits (ghashawāt). ASE.