Geniza Lab

Letter from Mūsā b. Abī l-Ḥayy, Alexandria, to Nahray b. Nissim. Offers details of ill-fated ships that were destroyed in a storm or met with the Byzantine navy. Of the ships that had been in al-Kanāʾis (a port in western Egypt), the only ones that had made it all the way to Alexandria were 7 ships of al-Ishfīlī, and one qārib apiece of Ibn Dayṣūr, Ibn Sindūr, Ibn al-Dajdāj, Ibn al-Jannānī and al-Jazūla — 12 in all. An unnamed enemy stopped one ship, and the others fled; and only 5 ships managed to set out on their way. Gil connects this with the 15 ships mentioned in T-S 8J27.2, his #447, and therefore understands this letter to imply that the ship of Ibn al-Baʿbāʿ was among those that hadn't yet returned to Alexandria). Musa is preparing to go to Palestine; he asks Nahray for a letter of recommendation (this part translated in Udovitch, "Formalism and Informalism"). Also mentions the fayj, and a tax receipt for the khums related to a consignment of raisins. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, vol. 3, #448, and from ibid., vol. 1, sec. 315, fn) There is a companion letter to this one, T-S 8J27.2 (PGPID 2084); see there for further details of the same events.

Letter from Nahray b. Nissim in Alexandria to his uncle Abū l-Khayr Mūsā b. Barhūn al-Tāhartī in Fustat. Dating (Gil): 11 or 12 of April 1051. Nahray reports among other things that he had forgotten to bring his capitation tax receipt "for the year 441" on a business trip. "I asked you to look for it in a linen bag among my belongings in your storeroom, and to send it with Abū Zakariyā al-Ḥannān. If my letters have already reached you, may God protect you, then you have undoubtedly sent it. If my letters have not yet reached you, then I request your attention to this matter, may God preserve your glory, so that (the receipt) will, God willing, reach me quickly." (Information from Marina Rustow)

Tax receipt with holes at the margin. General note on ENA 3944: It appears that the tax receipts under the classmark ENA 3944 were stored together throughout the Middle Ages and remained together until Adler sold his collection to JTS, at which point they were put under the same volume classmark. They had apparently been turned into a quire of reused paper at some point during the Middle Ages. Some have holes at the margin where they were apparently bound together. Whether this run of tax receipts is really from the Geniza is unclear; one of them has an Ottoman-era stamp, suggesting that the collection may have been owned prior to its sale to the Bodleian before 1910 or to Adler before 1922. MR.

Tax receipt, Fatimid. (In fact the handwriting looks Ayyubid, and the date seems to be 7 Muḥarram 607 AH = 1 July 1210 CE. The payment is made (min jihat) by a government employee (al-mustakhdam); the name Fakhr b. Yūsuf appears at the end of the line.)

Tax receipt, Fatimid. Registration marks - al-ḥamdu lil-lāh shukran and al-ḥamdu lil-lāh ḥamd al-shākirīn.

Tax receipt, Fatimid.