Geniza Lab

Accounts in the hand of Nissim b. Ḥalfon, presented to Nahray b. Nissim; 1066 CE. Lists payments for various goods, made either directly or through others, and gives details of various shipments, some of them to Tripoli, Libya. Mentions skins, textiles, beads, sugar, red wood, ammonia, furs, lead, baked goods, wine, meat, camphor, wax, tin, cloves, pearls and laque. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 3, p. 986.)

Letter from Natan b. Nahray (Alexandria) to Nahray b. Nissim (Fustat), ca. 1065. Mentions a silk cloak ordered by Nahray and shoes that were sent to him but did not arrive. Natan b. Nahray asks Nahray to send him some wine. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 3, p. 426 and from Goitein notes linked below.)

Letter from Ṭoviyya b. ʿEli ha-Kohen (Bilbays, Lower Egypt) to his cousin and brother-in-law, the judge Nathan b. Shelomo ha-Kohen (Fustat), 12th century. Ṭuviyahu b. ʿEli sends ten samples of two qualities of wine, asking Nathan b. Shelomo to offer them to a Jewish wine seller in order to make a deal. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below and Goitein, MedSoc, vol. 4, p. 259.)

Short note in dreadful handwriting in which the writer orders some wine, because he has just had blood let (wa-qad ukhrijtu l-dam). The name Avraham appears at the top.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Wide space between the lines. The writer is a tax farmer (or perhaps the agent/wakīl of one) in a rural area with cattle and water wheels and wood. He seems to be complaining about how little of the ḍamān proceeds he got to keep and how much work it is to supervise the cowherds and waterwheel users and get them to pay up. But there is a lot of technical language that requires further examination. "By the covenant! I had no resort but to drink with some qāḍī named Abū ʿAbdallāh and some uncircumcised (Christian) tax collector. The drinking was for a profitable thing they had proposed, not on account of any idleness of mine. They said..." In the margin he mentions Rabbenu, possibly the Nagid, and asks for a favor for a relative of his. On verso there are many very deferential phrases and a cryptic passage about insulting people and people's wives and things that can't be repeated in letters to the likes of the addressee. On verso there is also Hebrew liturgical text.

Recto: Note from Rashīd inviting a physician to come urgently to Rashīd's home, and to bring a friend. Verso: The physician responds that if he is being invited to a drinking party, he cannot come today because the Christians prevent him (? li-ajli moqesh al-'arelim). If he is being summoned to treat (mudāwā) somebody, probably al-Sadīd, it can be postponed to another day. Rashīd should tell al-Sadīd that the writer already came looking for him several times but could not find him. He was worried on his account ("the first was in my heart"), and he wondered if perhaps al-Sadīd no longer needed his services. Changing the topic, he concludes, "As for the the [Ar?]abic letter, I have it with me. I will make a copy of it and return it." Information in part from Goitein's index cards. ASE.

Accounts for wine production, submitted by Shelomo b. Eliyyahu to his father Eliyyahu the Judge. Similar to T-S Ar.18(1).127. This document is for the month of Av (year not specified), while T-S Ar.18(1).127 is for the month of Tishrei 1230 CE.

Recto: The first part is a description of a plant (ḥashīsha) that is effective against toothache. Its branches and leaves are like those of the eggplant plant; it has something on its branches that resembles a white mulberry but it is actually a fine thorn pod that latches on to anything it touches; indeed it cannot be touched due to its roughness; it has no fruit except for this white mulberry-like thorn. The second part is a wine recipe, translated by Goitein (Med. Soc. IV, p. 260): "Take two and a half dirhems' weight of each of the following: lichen (shayba), ginger, pepper, and barley flour, and half a dirhem of saffron. Mix all these together, pound them and bind the mixture with the same quantity [weight] of Egyptian bee honey and put it aside. Put two and a half dirhems' weight of this, together with one dirhem of colophony (qulfūniya or qalafūniya, a resin extracted from a pine tree or a terebinth), into each jar and plaster it over (wa-tulayyis). Leave it in the sun for seven days, after which it can be used. If you wish to have vinegar, put only one and a quarter of this stuff into each jar and leave it in the sun for eleven days. (Information in part from Ekaterina Pukhovaia.) ASE

Unsigned copy of a contract between Abū l-Bahāʾ b. Abū l-Mufaḍḍal and Abū l-ʿIzz (all called 'al-rayyis,' probably meaning physician here). Concerning 91 + 9 = 100 jars of laṭaf wine and 657.5 "broken" dirhams of Egyptian currency. In the damaged part, something about becoming vinegar when clay seals are not broken. Dating: ca. 1220 CE. Handwriting of Shelomo b. Eliyyahu? (Information in part from Goitein's index card and Ekaterina Pukhovaia.)

Letter from Avraham Ḥazzan. In Judaeo-Arabic. Written in a distinctive, rudimentary hand with some resemblance to T-S 12.271 but probably not the same scribe. The opening blessings are also distinctive (e.g., ואותק דוי ודי... אלנגיב אלמולוד... and then curses on צאלמין אלפאצלין). The sender seems to be requesting wine to revive his spirits, even if just a few ounces (margin, ll.1–2).

State petition regarding a Maghribī Jewish trader caught drinking with a Muslim woman and imprisoned. Cuts off right before the request: there arrived from the official who imprisoned them three sealed documents (khawātim khātim min qabl Munajjat al-Dawla) ... possibly to do with the jizya, a pretext for imprisoning them for moral offenses (?), suggesting that the trader was conspicuous and respectable, or his moral infractions might not have drawn attention. See also T-S NS J286, in which a man travels from Ceuta to Bijāya, Algeria, where the sāḥib al-Bijāya asks him how is related to a woman who is with him. (There is a ṣāḥib al-shūrṭa in ENA 3901.5, too.) The traveler (never described as a Maghribi trader, but a man from the Maghrib) claims she is his wife, but he has no kitāb to prove this. In T-S NS J286, they confiscate his māl and the man is put in prison with no reference to the woman. Although there is nothing about the three-day drinking binge, it’s plausible that these are the same case, and if not, they pair nicely.

Letter from Mevorakh b. Natan to Thiqat al-Mulk. In Judaeo-Arabic. Mevorakh describes his financial difficulties and asks for help obtaining wheat. He complains that al-Shaykh al-ʿAfīf Masarra had failed to provide wheat to Mevorakh's family during his absence on a journey (r9–11). When Mevorakh returned, he found his family sick and perishing of hunger (r6–7). (Information from Mediterranean Society, IV, pp. 243, 439)

Recto: Legal document in Judaeo-Arabic. It seems that a communal official undertakes to not miss any obligations on certain days, regardless of adverse weather, and that he will not get caught up in the drinking of wine. If he is witnessed violating this agreement, he will owe 1000 dirhams to the qodesh. Verso: Legal document in Judaeo-Arabic, in a different hand. Stipulating that a certain person will only fry foods in sesame oil (sīraj/sayraj). Dated: Monday, 4 Av 1758 Seleucid, which is 1447 CE. Witnesses: Shemuel b. Naṣrallāh al-Levi known as ʿAṭṭār; ʿAbdūn al-Kohen b. [...].

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic written by Abu al-Faraj. Mentioning several personalities known from Avraham Maimonides period (Menahem, muhadhdhab, Shemuʾel and Avraham Maimonides himself) among many other names. In the end of the letter the writer apologizes for writing the letter while drinking wine.

Prescription or recipe. In Judaeo-Arabic. "Its benefits are similar to the benefits of wine (khamr)." On verso there are jottings in Judaeo-Arabic: "In sleep (or: a dream). . . ra's al-matība. . ."

Report from the Grand Rabbinate of Cairo naming the butchers intended for the slaughter of poultry in the 5714AM, and an announcement of the schedule for the slaughter of poultry for the new year and the name of the kosher wine (religiously fit) – September 9 1953CE – Museum of Islamic Art – (number 124) – in Arabic.

Announcement from the Cairo Jewish community and by the rabbinate that all the wine sold by the company "Curiel Oriental" is not kosher, and an announcement on the slaughter of poultry on the eve of the holiday – May 10 1953CE – Bassatine Cemetery – Museum of Islamic Art – (number 219) – in Arabic. (information from Ḥassanein Muḥammad Rabīʿa, ed., Dalīl Wathā'iq al-Janīza al-Jadīda / Catalogue of the Documents of the New Geniza, 40). MCD.

Recto: Draft of a letter. "If your brother Abū Saʿīd does not have this amount, let him approach Abū Naṣr, and let the two of them return with this amount. . . . Tell him that as soon as it arrives, he should take it to Abū Zikrī." Verso: Lists of names (Bū Naṣr, Bū ʿUmar) and goods in Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic.

Letter from Aharon ha-Kohen b. ʿAmram (ZL), in ʿAkkā, to his son Shemarya b. Aharon, in Fustat. The son should not be content to study with his paternal uncle, but should study instead under Rabbenu. He should avoid evil occupations like drinking wine. The writer also sends condolences to Rabbenu. He hopes that the son will get a post (with the Nagid Mevorakh?). Dating: Late 11th century, because this Aharon signed T-S 28.4, l. 20, with Ṣemaḥ b. Yosef b. Ṣemaḥ (ZL), dated Tammuz 1100 (where he is quoted) and T-S 10J6.14 (which he also wrote). There are a couple very faded lines on verso. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.)

Debate poem between hashish and wine. In the hand of Nāṣir al-Adīb al-ʿIbrī. The narrator is a partisan of wine: "Hashish has a way / Of flipping the brain around. / If you want to go to Qalyub / You end up in Banhā! / Check out that stoned dude (masṭūl) .../ He looks like a ghoul (ghūl)." At the end, the narrator goes to a monk and pays him a dower to betroth 'the daughter of the vine.' This is one of the fragments that Nāṣir signs (anā al-ʿibrī...). ASE