Geniza Lab

Guarantee for a debt. Yūsuf b. Saʿīd agrees to cede 3/4 of a house and half of a ruin situated opposite it, to the orphan Hibat Allāh if he does not manage to pay him six dinars by Sivan 1461 Seleucid, which is April-May 1150 CE. (Information from Mediterranean Society, IV, 275.) On verso there is a list of copper vessels of a total value of 3 dinars in the possession of an orphan. (Information from Goitein's index card.) The bifolium bearing the shelfmarks Bodl. MS heb. d 66/110 and Bodl. MS heb. d 66/111 looks like it came from a court ledger. It is not immediately clear whether all the text pertains to the same case. ASE

Letter from Yehuda, unknown location, to Shalom, in Jerusalem. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: No earlier than 13th century, based on handwriting, overall appearance, and linguistic evidence. The sender asks the addressee not to allow Ṣadaqa to sell anything from the estate of the deceased 'mother' (i.e., the sender's daughter), which rightfully belonged to her two orphans, Avraham and Rebecca, and to whom the sender had conveyed all of his own rights in the inheritance. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, pp. 310, 495, and from Goitein's index cards)

Legal document. Written and signed by Mevorakh b. Natan. Location: Fustat. Dated: Middle decade of Iyyar 1484 Seleucid, which is 1173 CE, under the authority of the Gaʾon Sar Shalom b. Moshe ha-Levi. (This is the earliest known document from Sar Shalom's second term in office, after Maimonides held the title ca. 1171–72.) Abū l-Maʿrūf Ṣedaqa b. Shemarya has taken in the orphaned boy Hiba of his late brother Abū Saʿd al-Miṣrī, and he asks the court to grant money for him to support the boy. The court agrees to provide 10 dirhams a month out of the estate deposited in the name of the orphan. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, pp. 299, 493.)

Fragment of a letter in Arabic script, with some Hebrew words for the concluding blessings. Probably a letter of appeal for charity. The sender says that he is an orphan boy and mentions the coming holiday.

Letter from Yehuda Ibn al-ʿAmmānī, in Alexandria, to Eliyyahu the Judge, in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dated: 23 Nisan 1532 Seleucid, which is 1221 CE. There is a lengthy opening with expressions of longing and pleasantries. The addressee is asked to convey a legal query (fatwā) to Avraham Maimonides. Yehuda reports on the death of Hilāl b. Thābit b. Munīr, the brother of the cantor Bū l-Majd (Meʾir b. Yakhin). “[Hilāl] went to rest in the evening and did not awake in the morning. It was the first day of the holiday, and he was buried on the same day; he left a fine boy of sixteen, who studies with me" (trans. Goitein, Med Soc II, 220 and V, 155.) There are photostats and an edition in Goitein's notes (to be uploaded).

Letter requesting authorisation of a collection on behalf of an orphan girl about to marry. (Information from CUDL)

Shelomo b. Adaya, known as Ben ‘Adi, receives a loan of 45 dirhams from Hibat Allah, the orphan of the recently deceased Abu al-Faraj, in the last third of Elul 1460 sel. (August-September 1149) to be paid back in monthly installments of two qirats. Written and signed by Avraham b. Sa‘adaya in Sunbat. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS

Letter from a widow, with one orphaned daughter and whose house had collapsed, petitioning a high-ranking official in the community for assistance. The woman employs the common strategy of appealing especially for her fatherless daughter, and indicates furthermore that she herself was an orphan. (Mark Cohen, Voices of the Poor, 89) EMS

Legal document. In Arabic script. Dating: Ottoman-era, likely 16th or 17th century. Concerning the estate of the late Shemuel b. Dan, a Portuguese Jew. His brother Avraham (اورهم), living in Alexandria, attests to having received a sum of 50 gold dinars from Aḥmad(?) Amarillo b. Yosef the Jew, the agent of the daughter of the deceased, and he releases her and the agent from any further claims. ASE

Court record. In Hebrew. Written and signed by Yeḥiel b. Elyaqim (active 1213–33). "When the orphan went out... the craftsmen will examine him... what is written in the document that... this teacher and the court... and we have recorded what was done... as explained above." (Information in part from Goitein's index card and Med Soc III, p. 303, note 118.)

Letter addressed to ʿEli the Parnas. In Judaeo-Arabic. The sender petitions on behalf of a divorcee who came to him "complaining and crying" that her ex-husband, Avraham b. Khalaf, had not paid her and her nursing infant alimony for eight consecutive months. The woman had previously gone to the Parnas for help ("threw herself down in the house of the Parnas"), evidently to no avail. (Information in part from Goitein's index cards.) Join: Oded Zinger. ASE

Legal document in which the rabbinical court in Fustat, having to evaluate a workshop for purple making left to an orphan, invites non-Jewish experts to join the inspection. Dated Sivan 1410/ June 1099. (Information from Mediterranean Society, IV, pp. 172, 404)

Recto: Letter of the Na'ib of Malij to the judge Efrayim b. Meshulam regarding a case of an orphan girl. Asks for a quick decision. Verso: The answer, it seems in the hand of Meir b. Hillel b. Sadoq. Further information and partial transcriptions on Goitein's note card.

Account of the qodesh, ca. 1120. Revenue from different people is listed, mostly without specifications. The sums seem to represent money of the qodesh deposited with different parnasim. Sums of rent from the compound of al-Masasa, apparently "the compound of the Jerusalemites," are explicitly mentioned, and also from "the compound of the orphan girl," mentioned in T-S NS J292 verso. (Information from Gil, Documents, pp. 242 #43)