Geniza Lab

State document, probably a decree, last three lines, written on the joyous occasion of ʿĪd al-Naḥr. Preserved lines read as "فاعلم هذا واعمل..وكتب في يوم عيد النحر السعيد..الطاهرين وسلم تسليما". Fatimid based on blessings and late Fatimid/early Ayyubid based on paleography. Business accounts on verso.

Tax receipt for the capitation of Musāfir b. Yūṣuf in New Cairo, beginning with the 'tadhkira', at the top, registration marks related to the diwān al-jawālī. Dated: 502 H, which is 1108/09 CE.

State document. Dated: 26 Ramaḍān 524 AH = 2 September 1130 CE. A makhzūma (a type of official account) concerning the construction of a new or renovated belvedere (manẓara) across from either the Rawḍa island or a specific government garden (muqābil al-rawḍa al-saʿīda). Begins with the header "makhzūma," followed by, "bi-mablagh al-munfaq fī ʿimārat al-manẓara al-mustajadda al-maʾmūr bi-inshāʾihā." The project is overseen by officials with titles such as "majd al-khilāfa wa fakhruha" and "ṣanīʿat al-khilāfa." One may be named al-Qāḍī [...] al-ʿUmr (?) ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (?). They are both described as "mutawallī al-maʿūna bi-Miṣr." Al-Maqrīzī mentions this position during the Fatimid Caliph al-ʿĀmir's time in 515 H (See Ittiʿāẓ, III, p. 69). The date on the document is 524 H which fits with al-Maqrīzī's chronology, hence, it is plausible that the person referred to in the chronicle could be one of the officials mentioned in the document. Goitein translates 'maʿūna' as "a police building, although containing gruesome prisons, was called maʿūna, 'help' while the security forces themselves were divided into a number of specialized groups. The head of the police was called wālī, literally, 'governor'" (Goitein, Mediterranean Society, II:368). There are also copious other jottings in Arabic, most of them poetry and some pen trials. Needs further examination.

Legal document, deed of acknowledgment, concerning an inheritance dispute between Jamīla bt. Lāḥiq the veterinarian and her brother. Contains three testimonies at the bottom. The document is dated to the first half (niṣf al-awwal) of Rabīʿ II 467 H, which is right after the shidda ʿuzmā (454 - 465 H/ 1062 - 1073 CE), testifying to the restoration of legal and administrative order in the Fatimid empire following the massive famine period. Needs further examination.

Fiscal document, in Arabic script. Large format with 16 lines preserved, marginal notes, and crossings out. The document is an internal fiscal Fatimid accounting document mentioning military spending from the year 500/1106-7. There are large sums of money and iqṭāʿāt. Mentions an official of al-Afḍal by the name Zahr al-Dawla Bandūd (?) al-Afḍalī. (See al-Maqrīzī, Ittiʿāẓ, III, 34).

Petition to the Fatimid vizier concerning an allowance. Dating: First half of the 12th century. The verso contains a Judaeo-Arabic text concerning the Jewish calendar. Part of this text is written also on the recto between lines 6 and 8 of the Arabic document.

Pen trial consisting of the formula wa-mā tawfīqī ʾillā bi-llāh

Five lines remaining of an official report mentioning two messengers sent from the caliph (al-ḥaḍra al-ṭāhira) to Damascus and also mentioning the Banū Hilāl. The document was reused to make a kind of frame or possibly to plan an inscription.

Report or petition to a Fatimid caliph or vizier, opening blessings only. Dating: ca. 1100–71. Cuts off after the taqbīl clause. Addressee may be al-Afḍal b. Badr al-Jamālī (cf. Khan, Arabic Legal and Administrative Documents in the Cambridge Genizah Collections, p. 284). Cf. also CUL Or.1080.15.77 (Khan, no. 84).

On recto, Hebrew piyyuṭ. All around it and on verso, Arabic jottings and pen trials.

Verso: Account in Arabic script (Naïm Vanthieghem; description to come).

Letter in Arabic script concerning a governor, a bishop and monasteries. In the formal third-person address, the writer apologizes for sending the request in writing instead of making it in person; his excuse is that he’s pressed for time since he’s currently studying (ḥadīth? jālis ilā) at the feet of a certain Ibn Ṣāʿ. Asks the addressee write to the scribe of a Fatimid governor titled ʿAzīz al-Dawla with a request for two documents. The first document should be addressed to the bishop Binyāmīn of Ṭamwah (Dammūh), who is responsible for two monasteries, Shahrān (in Minyat al-Shammās) and Ḥilwān (also south of Cairo), “strengthening his hand,” presumably meaning reinforcing his property rights over the monasteries' property; the second should be addressed to the overseer of Shahrān itself, both strengthening the hand of the bishop and establishing who owns the property that belongs to the two monasteries. The property in question may be waqf property of the monasteries. The title of the governor, ending in al-dawla, dates the letter to the Fatimid period; contains a taqbîl clause, kissing the hand of the addressee rather than the ground, so likely 12th century rather than earlier.

Recto: Account in Arabic script, of unknown content. Torn and reused for a letter (see separate record).

Petition in Arabic script from a physician employed in the hospital in Cairo who had received orders to the effect that his pay would be cut (?), even though he hardly earns five dinars per month. He asks for the benefaction and kindness of a decree to the effect that (there the petition is cut off). The formulary is Fatimid but suggests the 12th century rather than the 11th. Reused for a private petition in Arabic and Hebrew script from and/or two a woman.

Letter written by someone who trains himself in writing a letter. The beginning of the letter reads: (1) bismi llāh al-raḥmān al-raḥim (2) waṣala kitabuka ayyuhā al-ʾaḫ al-fāḍil ḥafiẓaka (3) llāh bi-rāfatihi

Letter from Abū Naṣr, in Alexandria, to his brother al-Thiqa, in Fustat. There are greetings to Abū l-Ṭāhir Ismāʿīl and his son Sharaf(?), but these do not appear to be the actual addressees. In Arabic script. There are also a few words in Judaeo-Arabic in the address. The sender reports that he arrived safely from Fustat to Alexandria and found the children well. He stayed with his son Sulaymān. He claims that he could not find anyone with whom to send a letter for a span of two months, until he found Abū l-ʿAlā' b. al-ʿAfīf(?), with whom he is sending the present letter. The sender is apologetic and worried about two women, Sitt [...] and Fāḍila. He asks about the price of wheat. He asks for a loan/advance of 2 dirhams either from the addressee or from Sulaymān al-Dujājī, and he asks the addressee to buy okra with it and send it to him, no matter the price. ASE

Account in cash (dirhams and dinars)

Trial of the pen that reads among other things ḥadrat mawlaya al-šayḫ

Letter in Arabic script dated Monday 24 Jumādā I 517H (

Trial of the pen consisting of several basmala-s