Geniza Lab

Three court record entries, two dated Tevet 1339/December 1027 and one Shevat 1339/January 1028.

Court record concerning a widow who has received back her dowry but is still owed her marriage gift, in Bilbays, Elul 1515/August 1204 (Elul 12th does not match Tuesday as the of the week). On verso liturgical poems.

Court record of sale of a slave who had already lived in the house of the buyer and was therefore known to her.

Court record detailing that in Denia, Spain, Efrayim b. Yaakov appoints one Abun as his attorney to claim whatever his late father might have left him in Egypt. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 1:407, no. 45) VMR The deed was confirmed in Al-Mahdiyya, Tunisia, and again in Alexandria.

Court record concerning a grain dealer who promises to pay his former wife 4 dirhams every week for his five-year-old son, who was staying with her. The document further stipulates the boy visit the father on a Sabbath or a weekday, whenever he (the father) wished. In return, the divorcée acknowledges having received from her husband all that is due to her and agrees not to give him a bad name, nor sue him before a Muslim court or state authority. In case of default, she would be banned or excommunicated. Payments were to be made to a third person in Cairo, specified in the document. September, 1052. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 1:152, 438; 3:334-5, 502) EMS

Court record from 22 Sivan (4)802 A.M. (June 1042) regarding the marriage of a minor. On the other side of the page a legal opinion of a Muslim Judge in Arabic letters written on Rabi' al-Awwal 434 A.H. (October-November 1042). The two honorable members of the community who testified before the Muslim judge are the judge, Yosef b. Sulayman, and the cantor, Sahl b. Musa. Apparently, the Muslim judge had a mistake in writing the name of the cantor's father. The cantor should be identified with Yosef b. Yehoshuaʿ (Information from Frenkel).

Court record of a legal agreement between a husband, Abū l-Ḥasan Shelomo b. Menashshe, and his wife, Sitt al-Nasab bt. Abū l-Munā, in which he undertakes to settle her in her own domicile. Before marrying, they had agreed to live apart from his female relatives should she request it. After their marriage, they tried living with his family, but arguments broke out, and Sitt al-Nasab invoked her right to live separately. But Abū l-Ḥasan found himself broken-hearted on separation from his female relatives, so the couple now agreed to live under the same roof as his family again, but (1) to give Sitt al-Nasab a separate apartment in the house, (2) that Abū l-Ḥasan’s mother and sisters would not be allowed to enter it, (3) that they are forbidden from requesting as much as a matchstick from Sitt al-Nasab. The details of this new agreement were negotiated between Abū l-Ḥasan and Sitt al-Nasab’s paternal uncle, Abū ʿAlī. Dated: Kislev 1430 Seleucid, which is 1119 CE. Location: Fusṭāṭ. In the hand of the prolific court clerk Ḥalfon b. Menashshe (no relation). Signed by Avraham b. Shemaʿya and ʿOvadya ha-Kohen b. Mevorakh. The same couple also appear in T-S 13J2.20, dated 1445/1134.

Court record written by Efrayim b. Shemarya. A woman named Muluk claims to be the only heir of Tiban, the grandson of her maternal uncle. Dated Elul 1361/ August-September 1050. (Information from E. Bareket, Yehudei misrayim, pp. 194)

Court record. Location: Fustat. Dated: Tuesday, 21 Adar II 1377 Seleucid, which is 21 March 1066 CE. Maymūn b. Yaʿaqov declares that he acted as the authorized person for the brothers Shelomo and Moshe b. Avraham b. al-Lebdī, to receive the inheritance(?) of their father’s maternal uncle from Nissim b. Ḥalfon b. Benaya. It seems that Nissim b. Ḥalfon was supposed to pass on the money, books, and other items to the sons in Sicily, but he had traveled to Egypt instead. The completed document, signed by five people, shows that the brothers lived somewhere in the Maghrib and the problem was how to preserve for them the items concerned until they had them in hand. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 4, #823, and from Goitein and Friedman, India Book.) The witnesses: Yosef b. Yiṣḥaq Fāsī; Salāma b. Avraham; Menashshe b. Yefet ha-Levi; ʿEli b. ʿAmram ha-Levi; Yehuda b. Yaʿaqov ha-Levi. The validation (qiyyum) is signed by the ḥaver ʿEli b. ʿAmram (distinct from the ʿEli b. ʿAmram ha-Levi who signed the main document); Mevorakh b. Seʿadya; and Yiṣḥaq b. Moshe. VMR

Court record written by Yefet b. Ṭoviyya. In which Yefet and Yosef b. Binyamin the banker, as guardians of Avraham b. Shemuel ha-Sefaradi, collect a debt that was owed by Shemarya b. Shelomo to the late Shemuel. Dating: 1020–30 CE. (Information from CUDL and E. Bareket, Shafrir misrayim, pp. 207, 208)

Court record. Location: Fustat. Dated: 16 Elul 1355 Seleucid, which is 13 August 1044 CE. Written and signed by the cantor Yefet b. David; also signed by Khalaf b. Yefet and Raḥamūn b. Yiṣḥaq. Concerns a marriage settlement after a dispute. The husband[...] b. Saʿīd b. Ḥallūf and his wife, in which he promises not to beat her and to set her up in a house separate from his family, while she agrees not to leave the house. (Information in part from CUDL and Goitein's index cards.) Join: Oded Zinger. VMR.

Court record dated Av 1371/September-October 1060. Abu Sa'd b. Ishaq releases Sulayman from a debt of four dinars according to a ruq'a (note) dated November 1059. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Court record concerning a sum that a husband owes his wife as part of a divorce payment. (Oded Zinger, Women, Gender and Law: Marital Disputes According to Documents of the Cairo Geniza, 142-3) EMS

A certain [...] b. al-Gharbi declares he owes 200 dirhams to Abu al-Ma'ali al-Alawi. November 1193. (Information Goitein's index card). VMR

Fragment of a court record containing testimony about a negotiation between Abu al-Fadl b. Abu al-Majd and Abu al-Barakat b. al-Dayyan. In the top margin is an Arabic text recording a payment by al-Shaykh Abu Ali b. [...].

Court record concerning the claims of Avraham ha-Levi b. Toviah, later referred to as Abu Ishaq b. Tiban, who has received 34 out of the past-due 68 dinars owed to him by Abu al-Faraj b. Ma’mar. 1108-9 CE. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS

Court record concerning the release of payment in installments between Yeshu’a b. Avraham and Yaqub b. David. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS

Court record in the hand of Hillel b. ʿEli (ca. 1066–1108). Dated: Tammuz 1387 Seleucid, which is 1076 CE. Location: Fustat. Record of a partnership concerning half a qintar of opium. The participating parties are Avraham b. Elʿazar ha-Levi and Abū l-ʿAlāʾ ʿUlla b. Yosef ha-Levi. (Information in part from Goitein's index cards; Mediterranean Society, II, pp. 262, 582; EMS.) Join: Oded Zinger.

Bifolium from a court register containing a copy (nuskha; naqalnāhā mila be-mila) of a marriage contract between Tahir b. Abu al-Yemen [?] and Binat bint Ḥalfon whose fathers are both deceased. The marriage gift is fifty dinars and the dowry (partially mentioned) consists of valuable items like a neckband made of jets and pearls worth seven dinars, a pear pin, a shepherd's staff, a choker (hanak) with pearls and a lazam (jewelry worn on the chest) made of gold and pearls worth nine dinars. Written in the hand of Judge Mevorakh b. Natan. August 27, 1157.

Court record concerning evidence of possession of a compound in Fustat, mentioning lanes and buildings in the city. July 1130.