Geniza Lab

Letter of a son, Yiṣḥaq b. Yaʿaqov, to his father, Yaʿaqov b. Yiṣḥaq, containing 20 lines of polite phrases in Hebrew, another 6 in Arabic, and 3 announcing that he was unable to locate a certain person in the ministry of finance (dār al-zimām) in Cairo; he was told that the official left to visit his father in Dalāṣ. There are also some self-pitying lines about the writer's illness and unemployment. In a postscript the writer asks 'to close the account' and regrets to be unable to travel as he had no weapons to fight with. The writer may have reused a sheet of Arabic accounts, the beginnings of ~8 lines of which are visible on verso. Information from Goitein's note card. ASE.

State document, Fatimid period. Dated: 4 Rajab 523H, which is 23 June 1129 CE. Reporting that two trustworthy witnesses from Alexandria had given testimony, and that a document had come in answer to their testimony. One of their names has been preserved: Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥusayn b Ḥātim b. Ṣadaqa b. ʿUmar. Contains a registration mark (al-ḥamdu li-llāh ʿalā niʿamih). Another scribe has reused the document to copy the Fihrist of Shemu’el b. Hofni gaʾon. Details: An official document belonging to X (unnamed person: the هـ of kitab) was presented somewhere, but it needed to be verified, so two witnesses ratified it, presumably in Alexandria. The ratified document was then sent to a chancery where our writer recorded its contents, and equally importantly, registered the names of the two witnesses who had vouched for its authenticity. This is a bifolio register destined for the central Fatimid archives. Without more information on person X, and on the nature of this كتاب (was it a receipt, a legal deed, a rescript?), the document remains tantalizing and opaque, but useful as evidence of registration and archiving. Reused for the fihrist (index to the writings) of Shemuʾel b. Ḥofni (one fragment) and for Bava Metzia 49b (the other fragment: someone buying wine learned that Parzak the vizier was going to confiscate it, so he tried to renege before taking possession of the wine. R. Hisda approved: "just as they instituted 'pulling' with regard to sellers, so did they institute 'pulling' with regard to buyers"). (MR)

Amulet in Arabic script. It is even dated at the bottom; 16 Ṣafar [?]25.

Amulets or magical recipes, at least partially for curing various physical ailments, in Arabic.

Amulets or magical recipes in Arabic.

Magical/medical recipes in Arabic.

Magical instructions in Arabic.

Magical instructions in Arabic.

Large Arabic document with an ornate calligraphic header, otherwise very difficult to read. Needs examination.

Leaf from an Arabic treatise, calligraphic and vocalized. It appears to be a literary anthology, with quotations and verses cited from various Abbasid-era caliphs and poets. The margin on one side contains text from the mishna (Berakhot 4:2). The margin on the other side contains accounts in Arabic-script, naming people such as Abū Saʿd, Abū Isḥāq, Abū l-Faḍl, and Maʿānī.

Recto: A recipe in Arabic script (bāb yanfaʿ li. . . . yusḥaq. . . yukhlaṭ. . .), written in two different hands or at least with two different calami. Verso: Magical diagrams including an illustration of a bird, with captions in Arabic script.

Recto: A recipe in Arabic script. Verso: Three more lines in Arabic script, significance unclear. Underneath, in large letters, is written "bismillāh aṭāl allāh."

First three pages: Medical recipes in Arabic script. Fourth page (verso of BL OR 5565G.39): Document in Arabic script in a different hand. Needs examination.

Legal document in Arabic script. A contract made before a Muslim notary, in which the proprietor of a Nubian slave promises to pay to the Jewish physician Makārim b. Isḥāq b. Makārim an honorarium for the successful treatment of the slave's left eye (June, 1245)—how much is not said. The fee perhaps depended on the degree of satisfaction of the contractor. The idea that payment should be made to a physician only after successful treatment is as old as the Codex Hammurabi (paragraphs 215 ff.), and presumably much older. Med Soc II, 257, 580.

Business letter from Shelomo b. Mūsā al-Mahdawī, possibly in al-Mahdiyya, to his cousin Peraḥya b. Yosef, in Fustat. In Arabic script.

Upper end of a large deed in Arabic letters in which a Christian sells 1 and 2/3 out of 24 shares of a house in the Rāya quarter of Fustat to a foreign Jew who already owned 4 shares in it. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below.)

Fragment of a long legal document settling business accounts, involving a Mūsā who has gone missing, Berakhya, Sulaymān b. Yaʿaqov, Abū l-Surūr b. Natan, Maṣliaḥ, ʿAllūsh, and Yehoshua b. Natan. Verso: Three lines in Arabic script, apparently the draft of a beginning of a letter (a basmala followed by waṣal kitābak ayyuhā (?) l-ḥājib (?) aṭāl allāhu baqāk wa-adāma ʿizzaka wa-ta'ayyudaka). There are also a few jottings in Hebrew. ASE

Business letter in Arabic script from an unknown trader to another unknown trader regarding textiles: Siqillī, Ṭabarī, and Sūsī cloth. Second half of the eleventh century.

Accounts of a bookseller from first half of the 12th century, as it mentions Netanel ha-Shishi. There are lists in Judaeo-Arabic on both sides, as well as lists of names and numbers in Arabic script on both sides. The Judaeo-Arabic portions are edited by Allony et al. Arabic portion awaiting transcription.

Letter from Nahray b. Nissim (Misr) to Abu Ishaq Barhūn b. Salih at-Tahirti (Busir).