Geniza Lab

Beginning of a draft of a court record in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe (1100–38 CE), mentioning the issuer Abū ʿImrān Moshe b. Yefet ha-Kohen ("Glory of the Community"), and the recipient, his wife, Zayn known as Sitt al-Ḥusn bt. Moshe ha-Kohen ha-Sar (her father is titled Saniyy al-Dawla). Date and signatures are not preserved. (Information in part from CUDL)

Recto: fragment of a document in which the parties are Nabā and Shemuʾel. Verso: part of another document. (Information from CUDL)

Fragment of a legal document from Fusṭāṭ, possibly the acknowledgment of a loan. (Information from CUDL)

Legal document. Partnership agreement. Unsigned. Dated: Middle third of Iyyar (year not preserved). Location: Fustat. Replacement document for a partnership agreement between Abū l-Ḥasan Menashshe b. Seʿadya ha-Kohen and the parnas Yosef b. Shelomo. Yosef was the original document holder, but apparently lost the document. Contains court testimony declaring the terms of the partnership to have lapsed, stating the partners to have no claims on each other following the partnership's termination and release. The duration of the partnership was specified in the earlier document but isn't recorded here. Yosef appears to have been the active partner, entrusted with the partnership document itself as well as the subsequent release. The structure of the partnership is as described by Maimonides (half of any funds given to a partner for a transaction are considered a loan). However, the upper portion of the document is missing and the first few extant lines contain lacunae. Profits and losses are to be divided in the same proportion which the Talmudic and Geonic sources permit only if the partners have other commercial relationships together. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture," 103)

Fragment (last part) of a court bill in the hand of Daniel b. Azarya. (Information from Gil, Palestine, vol. 2, 715, #390) Verso: Arabic accounts and jottings (very similar to T-S 12.042 and T-S 12.157). (Information from CUDL) VMR

Fragment from the ketubba of [...] Ṭayyib ha-Levi (groom) and ʿAwz bat [...] (bride). Location: Fusṭāṭ. (Information from CUDL.)

Court record, calligraphically written, from a lawsuit about changing the configuration of the main hall of a house. During the dispute a Muslim judge was bribed. The intervention of Shemarya (b. Elhanan apparently), the rav, or highest Jewish religious authority, is requested. Dated ca. 1000. (Information from Mediterranean Society, IV, p. 84)

Recto: ketubba of [...] b. Nissim (groom) and Jins (bride), a divorcee. Locaiton: Fusṭāṭ. Verso: title page for laments for the 9th of Av. In the margin is the name of a copyist, Ḥalfon b. Beraḵot, a date, Kislev 1402 of the Seleucid era (= 1090 CE), and jottings. (Information from CUDL.)

Fragment of a marriage contract.

Ketubba (marriage contract) fragment that begins with the clause setting forth the wife’s obligations (to serve, etc.) and concludes with a dowry list. A minimum marriage gift of twenty-five gold dinars is stipulated, and the document contains a Hebrew clause stating that the husband will not be obligated to pay the marriage gift unless he divorces his wife willfully and she is not guilty of misconduct. (Friedman, Jewish Marriage, vol. 2, 347-49) EMS

Ketubba (marriage contract) fragment describing that one-third of a house is given to a daughter upon marriage, on the condition that it would become her property only after her mother’s death; the boundaries of the house are precisely delimited. The document begins with the clause detailing the sums of the marriage payment, and the trousseau list contains three types of skullcaps, a bed cover and four cushions, a pair of earrings and a gold pin, two garments with borders of another color, and a shawl, amongst other items. (Friedman, Jewish Marriage, vol. 2, 332-8) EMS

Trousseau list. In Judaeo-Arabic. Groom: Ḥalfon ha-Levi b. Shelomo. Bride: Khalīfa bt. Avraham. Dating: Probably no later than 1032 CE, because Ḥalfon's father is not marked as dead in this document, and there is a signature from a Ḥalfon ha-Levi b. Shelomo (ZL) in T-S 16.45 from 1032 CE. The total value of the trousseau amounts to 865 dinars. Goitein's note card suggests that some of the prices, especiallly of household goods, are exaggerated.

Deed of release in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. The daughter of (Shelomo) ha-Kohen ha-Zariz (see Bodl. MS heb. c 28/68) releases her ex-husband Abū ʿAlī Yefet from alimony for his daughter, and her father stands security for her in Jewish and Muslim courts and supplies his daughter with all her needs. Obviously she thought that because iṣṭilāḥ(?) was considered (l. 9), she was entitled to alimony. This means that she left him against his will. Dated: Written in the first decade of Nisan and signed the first decade of Iyyar 1341 of the Seleucid Era (= 1120 CE). Witnesses: Ḥalfon b. Ghālib the cantor; Ḥalfon b. Araḥ; Yosef b. Nuʿmān. Validation signed by Yiṣḥaq b. Shemuel ha-Sefaradi, ʿUlla b. Yosef ha-Levi, and Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. (Information from CUDL and Goitein's index card.)

Engagement (shiddukhin) and betrothal (qiddushin) contract. Location: Fustat. Dated: 10 Nisan 1554 Seleucid, which is 1243 CE. Groom: Yosef b. Avraham. Bride: Rivqa bt. Avraham ha-Parnas, virgin. The marriage proper (dukhūl) will take place in the upcoming Tishrei. Early marriage payment: 10 dinars ("with the well-known conditions concerning henna and strings &c."). Delayed marriage payment: 50 dinars. Witnesses: ʿImmanuel b. Yeḥiel; Yehuda ha-Kohen b. Yisrael. (Information in part from Goitein notes and index card linked below.)

Legal document. Partnership agreement. Dating: 1229. Location: Fustat. In a document written in Hebrew emerging from the court of Abraham Maimonides, Abū al-‘Alā b. Joseph and his father enter into a partnership with Mufaḍḍal in a sugar factory, splitting profits and losses evenly. Mufaḍḍal gave 50 dinars to "his Elder" (possibly his grandfather), which would act as capital to be used by the grandfather to purchase raw sugar; as well as an additional 50 dinars to his partners. The purpose of this document is to bring Mufaḍḍal into the relationship between Abū al-‘Alā and his father; no qinyan between the father and son is recorded here. Goitein points out that although the relationship is well-defined here, it may not have been canonized with a formal qinyan. The document may have been written for Mufaḍḍal and to record his investment (100 dinars) and the split of profits or losses due to him.The sole preserved signatory, the judge Yehiel b. Eliakim of Aleppo, is known to have signed other documents with Abraham Maimonides. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture," 106)

Marriage contract mentioning in the dowry list, among other garments, a 'jukaniyya,' a garment covering body and head, made of 'white dabiqi'' and worth two dinars. Dated between 1184-1186. (Information from Ashtor, Prix et salaires, pp. 153, 155, 160)

Legal agreement from Fustat, written by the hand of Avraham b. Aharon Ha-Mumkhe.

Bottom of a ketubba. The groom is named Efrayim ha-Levi. Several witness signatures are preserved, including Menashshe(?) b. Seʿadya ha-Kohen, Yiṣḥaq b. Ghālib the cantor, Avraham b. Ḥalfon, and Avraham b. Aharon he-Ḥaver.

Ketubba fragment (upper left corner). Bride: Bahiyya bt. Yosef, a virgin. Early marriage payment: 20 dinars. Dating: ca. 1040 CE (per Goitein). There is a one-line header (superscription), as in (the documents of?) Yefet b. David. (Information from Goitein's index card.)

Beginning of a legal document dated 1213 CE, under the reshut of Avraham Maimonides, involving Abu Isḥāq b. Sayyid al-Ahl al-Miṣrī.