Geniza Lab

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.)

Two lists of partly identical persons, the first without, the second with sums, ranging from 1 through 11 dirhams and 1/4 dinar. The first list comprises fourty persons, of these some scholars, others foreigners or persons in inferior positions, such as employees or gatekeepers. These lists were probably prepared for the capitation tax, the second list indicating perhaps the sums still due, to be paid by the community if the persons concerned were unable to pay. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below and Goitein, MedSoc, Vol. 2, p. 454, no. 54.)

Account, dated 1516 (ttqkb = 922, i.e. 1516 CE), in Hebrew, mentioning a khizana, treasury, seemingly a box in which all revenue was deposited and from which all expenditure was made. Nothing like this appears in documents from the classical Geniza period, which, Goitein writes, reflects 'the cumbersome system of financing the social services [which] had its source partly in the general technical imperfections of medieval administrations. The accumulation of public funds in one treasury was to some extent avoided in order to preserve them from the overreaching of rapacious government officials.' Written in the Hebrew language, and the writer, although using that Arabic word and dating according to Muslim months, apparently was a European, to judge from his spelling of Arabic names. (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, p. 101 [date given on p. 543]). Perhaps better explained by the non-corporate nature of the community in those centuries, at least. This late document may reflect the custom of Jews from Europe, who were used to a more corporate form of organization. One side: assets (=left in the khizana); other side, payments (=I gave to), with recorded total of one thousand 186 dr. (dirhams) (Information from Cohen)

Letter from a certain Yiṣḥaq to the Gaʾon Sar Shalom ha-Levi b. Moshe (active 1171–95 CE) and his deputy Shelomo. In Hebrew. The sender is a newcomer in the city (presumably Fustat) and complains about the lack of hospitality. He has been traveling for 3 years and left a wife and children suffering under the rule of the Christians (ערלים). He asks for money so that he can go and retrieve his family and from there go to Jerusalem. Verso contains three lines of text, probably the address of the note (it mentions Sar Shalom), crossed out. (Information in part from CUDL.)

Letter from a man, in Damascus, to his father, perhaps in Fustat. The sender expresses his longing and desperation in this foreign land, especially after the departure of Manṣūr ("the world closed itself in on me... I cry... and wish my soul would leave, but it does not"). He reports that he is revered, because he has successfully humiliated all the competing cantors, and now nobody dares to chant in his presence. (The father seems to be a cantor as well.) His father was upset that he entered the service of "someone like the ghulām"; Manṣūr will explain everything when he arrives. He was unable to send some of the goods for his brother; Ibn Abū l-Zakkār may have told him not to trust a potential bearer. He has sent with Manṣūr a mould of cheese worth 2.5 dirhams, and he has equipped Manṣūr with funds to keep the cheese well-oiled en route lest it dry out. He complains about the lack of sustenance in Damascus. He claims to fast most days out of sorrow/longing, and he repeatedly asks for prayers. He is worried that his enemies will gain the upper hand over him (he may have seen this in a dream? Verso, line 8). He describes the hospitality of his paternal uncles and their children and his maternal aunt. He asks for news of potential fiancees back home—his cousin (bint ʿamm) and Nabaʾ—since the locals in Damascus are trying to set him up with a local woman. He emphasizes that he would never get married with his father absent. He alludes to a period of a year when he had a falling-out with his father, a rift which is now healed (this may explain some of the over-the-top language of longing in this letter). He asks for some aqwāl, which should be sent to the house of the Nezer along with instructions to forward them to Aleppo should the son have traveled already. He concludes by warning his father to seal all of his future letters—"and not with a heavy seal." (Information in part from CUDL.) ASE

Legal document. This fragment describes a partnership in a dyeing business between Efrayim b. Yaaqov al-Mawṣilī and Abraham b. Hiba al-Dimashqī. Efrayim, the owner of the shop, invests slightly more capital (nineteen dinars to Avraham’s seventeen dinars and five qirāṭs). Abraham is to manage the shop, and he is granted one dirham each day from partnership funds for his maintenance/ Efrayim seems to be granted a similar amount. Profits and losses are to be divided equally, though rental income from the shop itself goes to Efrayim, as he is the owner of the shop. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture," 66)