Geniza Lab

Petition to the Gaʾon Maṣliaḥ ha-Kohen (in office 1127–39). Begins with six lines of Hebrew blessings, and ends with one line of Hebrew blessings. The sender describes himself as a man of more than seventy years who has been afflicted by an illness that makes him unable to work and earn a livelihood. He owes a debt (or rather capitation tax payment?) of 14 qirats and 1 dirham; somehow this is connected to a man named Salāma Ibn al-Maqāniʿiyya and a guarantee. If he is unable to pay, he fears being imprisoned. He states that he is near death and starving, some days eating and some days not. Maṣliaḥ had previously promised to help him pay this sum, so this letter is a reminder. In the margin, mentions a meat shop and someone named Mīkhāʾīl. Verso is filled with Arabic-script jottings and document drafts in a chancery hand, including drafts of a letter or petition to a notable. VMR. EMS. ASE.

Letter in Hebrew. The writer is asking from the official (maybe the head of the Jews himself) to support Mevaser ha-Parnas, who claimed that he had an inheritence owed to him from his brother Sedaqa ha-Parnas, being held by Mevorakh. At the bottom of the letter is an addendum saying that the letter was delayed. The writer adds greetings to the head of the yeshiva, Shelomo Gaon. ENA 2806.5–7 are copies of letters to Shelomo Gaʾon and his son Maṣliaḥ.

Letter from Natan b. Mevorakh ha-Kohen and Yeshuʿa b. Yefet, in Ashqelon, to Eliyyahu b. Evyatar ha-Kohen. Dated: 13 Ḥeshvan 1424 Seleucid, which is 1112 CE. None of the body of the letter is preserved (only the introduction, conclusion in the upper margin, and address on verso).

Account of the Qodesh: building expenditures, ca. 1040. List of expenses, beautifully written by Yefet b. David b. Shekhanya. Materials for the construction of a ceiling are being prepared. Work on a "wind catcher," plastering, supplies of clay, and sewage work are also among the items listed. Clay is paid for after having been weighed by "the Christian," obviously a Copt, the Copts being much involved in building work. Mentions a wind catcher (bādhanj). (Information from Gil, Documents, pp. 187 #18)

Verso: Opening of a letter from Sherira Gaon sent to Qayrawān. Dating: ca. 970 CE. This is a continuation from the first part of the opening, in T-S 12.370. (Gil, Kingdom, vol. 2, Doc. #22.) VMR. But Gil does not seem right that the two fragments are actually joins with each other.

Letter from Avraham, son of the Gaon and people from Fustat to Shelomo b. Yehuda

Letter from the Yeshiva in Egypt to Khalaf b. Yiṣḥaq and Yosef b. Avraham in Aden. Cairo, ca. 1132.

Letter from Shemarya b. Maṣliaḥ, in Fustat, to the Nagid Yaʿaqov b. ʿAmram, in Qayrawān. Dating: probably spring or summer of 1039 CE, and in any case 1038–42 CE, the period of conflict between Natan b. Avraham and Shelomo b. Yehuda over the gaʾonate in Palestine. The letter drafts on both recto and verso are about that conflict and the question of the loyalties of the community of Qayrawān. Signed by Shemarya but from a group of people; Shemarya's signature is in a different hand from the letter itself, and according to Gil, the scribe is Ghālib b. Moshe ha-Kohen, the son-in-law of Efrayim b. Shemarya. Both Gil and Cohen assume that additional leaders of the Fustat community were planning to sign the letter. This letter covers some of the same ground as the letter on verso; we additionally learn that the support that Natan b. Avraham claimed to have secured in the Maghreb came from the elders of Qayrawān. Jacob Mann published T-S 18J4.16, and Mark Cohen discovered the join with ENA 3765.10 and the significance of this pair of letters. (Information from Goitein, Cohen, Gil, and CUDL.)

Letter of Daniel b. Azarya, December 1051.

Letter (fragment) from Daniel b. Azarya (ca. 1055) to Eli b. Amram, Fustat, 1052.

List of the Pesiqa, upper part of three pages containing the names of contributors, headed by Abu al-Mufaddal, who pledges 1/8 dinar. The others give dirhams, namely: 1 party gives 3 d; 8 parties give 2 d; 16 parties give 1 d; 4 parties give 1/2 d;, 2 (sum not preserved). As indicated by the cut of the extant fragment, it probably contains less than half the original list. (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, p. 503, App. C 119)

Letter from Avraham ha-Reviʿi b. Shemuel ha-Shelishi, probably in Ramla, to Shelomo b. Yehuda, in Jerusalem. In Hebrew. Dating: Ca. 1040 CE. The letter is also signed by the physician ʿAmram b. Aharon ha-Kohen. (There was a liturgical poet by the name of Shemuel ha-Shelishi ("the Third") whose works survived in the Geniza and who lived around 1000, so this could well be his son.) The bearer of the letter is Moshe b. Mevasser. The senders ask the addressee to ensure that he receives the full third of his father's inheritance that is due to him; there are 3 brothers (including a Natan b. Mevasser), and none is the firstborn. Shelomo b. Yehuda writes about the same case in T-S 20.178. There is also a request "to obtain a little kohl for me to remove the whiteness from the eye of my little daughter," and a request for emblic (amlaj). There may be a reference to the controversy with Natan b. Avraham. (Information in part from Gil.) MR. ASE.

Letter from Daniel b. Azarya. On verso some names and jottings in Arabic

Letter from Eli Ha-Kohen b. Ezekiel, to Efrayim b. Shemarya, Fustat, approximately 1030. The writer cites his illness as an excuse for something (recto, 18–19).

Letter (fragment) by Shelomo b. Yehuda written in his own hand (Gil); 1041.

Letter from the congregation of Tripoli, Lebanon, to Hesed b. Sahl. Synagogues in other places have been returned to the Jews, but in the writer's town the synagogue was turned into a mosque. See also PGPID 767 (Gil's edition of the same document). Verso has Hebrew poems.

Letter from the community of Tripoli (Lebanon) to Hesed Ha-Tustari. 1025. See also PGPID 766.

Letter from David b. Daniel to a parnas (leader of the Jewish community). Written in his own hand, per Gil. In Judaeo-Arabic. Instructing the addressee to obtain from Abū l-Riḍā Shelomo b. Mevorakh 60 wariq (low-quality) dirhams and to pay them to the divorcee of Abū l-Baqāʾ Shemuel. He is to inform her that this payment is for maintenance of his (Shemuel's) daughter for a period of two full months. Her family and kin must cease their objections, because this monthly payment (30 wariq dirhams) is more than she has a right to by law. The parnas should convey this payment to her every month going forward.

Communal/legal record. Dated: Wednesday, 23 Ṭevet 1493 Seleucid, which is December 1181, under the authority of the Gaʾon Sar Shalom ha-Levi. Abū l-Munajjā al-Kohen, surnamed al-Zariz, collector for the charitable foundations in New Cairo, turns in 100 dirhams that were used for the distribution of clothing, and an additional 50 that were spent on another approved charity. (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, 423)

Verso: Account of the qodesh. Dating: ca. 1215 CE, according to Gil. This document records sums deposited by several collectors of the qodesh with its central administration. Details about 1,010 dirhams and other sums received from rents and delivered by the writer to various communal officials. The writer is apparently one of the judges of the court in Fustat. The account is written on the verso of a bill of sale for an Indian female slave, which was concluded in 1155 CE (see PGPID 11413). (Information from Gil, Documents, p. 409f, doc. #111, and Goitein, Mediterranean Society II, p. 428, App. A, sec. 138.)