Geniza Lab

General power of attorney. The presiding court is Qaraite (per Goitein). Location: Fustat. Dated: Adar II 1396 Seleucid, which is 1085 CE. Abū l-Ḥusayn Manṣūr b. Yiṣḥaq b. ʿAllūn appoints Efrayim b. Allūn ha-Kohen as his attorney. Signed by David b. Ṣedaqa b. Yisrael; ʿEli b. Efrayim b. ʿEli. The validation is written and signed by Mevasser b. Mevorakh. (Information from Goitein’s index card.)

Court record, 1039. Banīna bt. Avraham in Alexandria, who had been deserted by her husband Yosef, appointed her brother Shelomo as her attorney. Accompanied by two witnesses to this arrangement, the brother appeared before Efrayim b. Shemarya’s court in Fustat, where the power of attorney was ratified. The brother appointed a cantor and clerk of the court as his sister’s permanent representative. Verso is blank. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below, Goitein, MedSoc, Vol. 3, p. 203.)

Power of attorney to receive four dinars from Abu al-Muna, given by Yakhin b. Elazar of Minyat Zifta to Yosef al-Miqdasi b. Allun. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Power of attorney. In Hebrew. Dated: Location: Aleppo. Dated: Thursday, 16 [...] [13]48 Seleucid, which is 1036/37 CE. Ḥaggay appoints Yiṣḥaq b. Yaʿaqov to collect 1,750 dirhams from the representative of the merchants in Tyre, called Shelomo b. Avraham. Written and signed by the ḥaver Tamīm b. Ṭoviyya. On verso there are accounts in Judaeo-Arabic and Hebrew literary text. (Information from Goitein’s index card)

Power of attorney by Shemuel Ibn al-Lebdi from late tenth-early eleventh century Fustat. Shemuel appoints a man (only 'son of Ḥalfon' survives) to sue Nissi b. Yaʿaqov.

Power of attorney written by Avraham, son of the Gaon in his own hand, October-November 1039 (Gil).

Legal document. Power of attorney. Dated: November 1050. Location: Fustat. An unsigned assignment of power of attorney from Eleazar Manṣūr ("Head of the Congregations") b. Menaḥem of Aleppo to Hillel b. Avraham. Eleazar waives all right to the claim that Hillel subverted his agency, suggesting this is an unlimited power of attorney. Although documents granting unlimited power of attorney are typically granted to agents effecting marriage, this document reveals Eleazar to have been appointed to collect on an inheritance claim advanced by one Mulūk bt. Neḥuma b. Wahab, a claim described in T-S 18J2.12 (PGPID 3527) wherein Mulūk explains that her inheritance was left by her father’s wife with Tamīm; in this document, Eleazar appoints Hillel to collect Mulūk’s inheritance from "…any person at all, among them… Tamīm…" (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture", 86-87)

Legal document. Power of attorney. Dated: 1115. Location: Al-Maḥalla. ʿOvadya b. Efrayim ha-Levi Rosh ha-Qahal empowers 'ḥemdat ha-yeshiva' Avraham b. Natan ha-Sheviʿi to money owed to him ("from a partnership and a claim and a rental") on his behalf. ʿOvadya not only states that he has not retained Avraham only "to advance my cause and not to subvert [it]", but also that he will accept whatever the court rules, in stock halachic phrasing. The agent, Avraham b. Natan, is well-known from Geniza documents (Cohen 1980, pp.130-131) identifies him in the circle of the Head Mevorakh b. Saadya, noting that he acted as a mediator in other business affairs. His role in this document seems to have been settling the matter of the partnership, perhaps in court. Two of the witnesses to the power of attorney, Zakkay b. Shelomo and ʿEli b. Shelomo, may have been brothers. Also signed by Yehuda b. Shemuel and validated by Aharon b. Yeshuʿa ha-Rofe and Avraham b. Yeshuʿa. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture", 92-93)

Fragment from a court testimony (a power of attorney) delivered in 1095/6. The date appears in a similar small fragment in the same hand and apparently part of the same page preserved in B3475. The verso is blank.

Fragment from a court testimony (a power of attorney) delivered in 1095/6. A similar small fragment in the same hand and apparently part of the same page is preserved in B3476. The verso contains illegible faded writing in a different hand.

Power of attorney. Location: Probably Qayrawān. Dating: ca. 1030s CE. Dealing with a debt of 74 dinars owed by Salmān b. Sahlūn to Yosef b. Yaʿaqov. Signed by Yaḥyā b. Solomon, Yeshuʿa b. Yosef ha-Shofeṭ ha-Kohen (whose signature is surrounded by an elaborate motto), and Avraham b. David b. Labrāṭ. (Information from CUDL and Goitein's index cards)

Ishaq b. Avraham appoints Furat b. Yosef as a power-of-attorney against neighbors who had taken possession of the house he had inherited in the village of Manda in the Galilee. Dated ca. 1030 and written by Yefet b. David b. Shekhanya (Goitein) or by Efrayim b. Shemarya (Bareket). (Information from from Bareket, p. 147, and from Goitein's attached notes.)

Letter from Mevasser b. David in Damsis to Nahray b. Nissim in Fustat, ca. 1053. The main issue discussed in the letter is an argument between Mevasser and Nahray on the one side and a Christian on the other side. The Christian had financial claims which were not deemed acceptable by Mevasser. Mevasser b. David complains about financial difficulties, especially since he left Mahdiyya where his family remained and lost his property during travels. He anticipates a difficult year for his family, due to famine and rising prices. The letter refers to pearl and book trade and gives the recipient the power of attorney for a sale of silk. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 4, pp. 299-300 and Goitein notes linked below.)

Letter in which a man complains about a conflict over a power of attorney and a deposit. The sender of the letter held the opinion that he had not done his opponent any harm but the latter had accused him in public of the opposite, threatening to bring this and other matters to the attention of the government.

Yehoshuaʿ b. Natan ha-Sefaradi gives to his son, Shemuel, power of attorney to sue Aharon b. Yosef, known as Ibn al-Ghazzal (spinner) in Zawilat al-Mahdiyya and Susa. Dated 1047. (Information from Mediterranean Society, I, 416, and from Goitein's index cards)

Fragment of power of attorney signed by four persons including the judge Shemuel b. Saadya (in office 1165-1203) and deputy judge Jephthah b. Yaʿaqov (in office 1182-1219). Dated to the last quarter of 12th century. (Information from Goitein's index cards and Mediterranean Society, II, pp. 124, 546.) Looks like the hand of the court scribe Yosef b. Shemuel b. Seʿadya ha-Levi (c. 1181–1209).

Power of attorney given by Yosef the hazzan b. Nissim to Yefet b. Natan to deal with the grantor's house. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Power of attorney granted in a divorce settlement. Dated to the 11th century (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Power of attorney to Perahya ha-Kohen to recover in India goods entrusted to Abu al-Faraj, Nissim al-Raqqi. Fustat, early 1090s.

Legal document. Court ruling. Dated: July 1084. Written in the hand of Hillel b. Eli. Location: Fustat. Yaḥyā b. Samuel sues Amram b. Abraham for various commodities (wool, flax, and cinnamon in exchange for silk robes, silver scammony, and saffron) which represent the former’s investment with the latter. However, Amram seems to have placed the items in the care of Abū al-Ḥusayn al-Tinnīsī, who seems to have assumed responsibility for them by means of a power of attorney. Apparently, Aaron sold the items and prepared an account sheet, remitting the balance to Amram, who then settled his account with Yaḥyā. At the time the matter is to be adjudicated, Amram has left Fusṭāṭ and Yaḥyā asks for a continuance. Yefet b. Avraham, counterparty in the sale of a quantity of silver to Abū al-Ḥusayn, also appears in a number of geniza documents. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture," 110). Verso seems to contain another legal discussion with the same partners over similar issues.