Geniza Lab

Recto: report to Al-Afḍal ibn Badr al-Jamālī for the attention of the amir Ḥusām al-Dawla regarding a quantity of unspecified produce that had been left unattended. The petitioner asks for new watchmen to be provided. Dating: early 12th century. (Information from CUDL)

Petition to the vizier of al-Ẓāfir, Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAlī Ibn al-Salār, regarding a fief worth 5500 dinars and a market worth 1000 faddān that were repossessed by the judge operating in Minyat Ghamr, who did not return them even after the issue of a decree by the vizier. The petition indicates that some of the grounds in discussion are cultivated with sugar cane. Dating: 544–48 AH, which is 1149–53 CE. On verso and between the lines of the petition on recto there are piyyuṭim including a seliḥa and a reshut. (Information from Khan and CUDL)

Main document: Petition or letter draft from Sulaymān b. Bunayy(?). In Arabic script. Dating: Late. The margins and verso are filled with additional documents or jottings in Hebrew, Judaeo-Arabic, and Arabic script. One of the Judaeo-Arabic text blocks contains a very formal taqbīl preamble addressed to someone in the government. Needs further examination.

Brief official letter in Arabic script. With a stamped seal in the margin next to the name of the issuer/sender (Muṣṭafā something). Dated: 10 Rajab 997 AH = 25 May 1589 CE. Addressed to 'all the qubbāḍ (tax collectors?)' in the district of Shubra(?), issuing an instruction concerning heads of livestock. Needs further examination.

State document, probably a report to a higher official (not a petition). This is a long strip cut from the right side of the document. At top, "ṣalawāt allāh." Mentions a sum of money (mablagh); [...] b. Abū l-ʿIzz b. Manṣūr; something "al-muʿaẓẓam" (probably a reference to a document, as this is followed by al-muʾarrakh); and taqdīr ʿamal min dīwān al-Ṭ[...]. There may be a damaged date in the last line of the main text block. There are portions of two more lines after a long space, including the phrase "an yakūna." On verso there are Hebrew liturgical pieces with other material interspersed, including several references to the prayer of Ḥanna.

Petition from a group of people to a chief vizier (Sayyid al-Wuzarāʾ) titled "al-Kāmilī." In Arabic script. Fragment (upper half only). The petitioners complain that there is a Jewish man named Sulaymān in Fustat, the son of an Indian female slave (ibn jāriya hindiyya) who spends all his days obstructing business and frightening people in the drug/perfume market (sūq al-ʿaṭṭārīn), just like Ibn al-ʿUṣfūr used to do. (Goitein wonders if there might be a connection to T-S K25.64 and BL OR 5566B.30, which feature a troublemaker nicknamed ʿUṣfūr al-Jinn.) This man Sulaymān apparently raves about nonsense or impossible things (qawl al-muḥāl). When the Jews were resting in their houses on Shabbat, he assaulted them with "raqqāṣīn" (couriers? dancers? journeymen?) and expelled (? akhraja) their women, and frightened "us" (the pronoun slips here from "them" to "us"—an indication that the petitioners are the persecuted Jews themselves?). (Information in part from Goitein's index card.) ASE

Report or petition. In Arabic script. In a chancery hand, wide space between the lines. Two lines are preserved, it seems praising the grace and mightiness of the addressee, a vizier. On verso there is Arabic poetry (about injustice?).

Petition from a woman to a high dignitary or perhaps to al-Malik al-ʿĀdil himself (one reigned 1200–18 and another reigned 1238–40). She seems to be appealing for redress against a Christian tax farmer named Abū l-Fakhr and an intricate network of his family members, including his son, his brother Abū Saʿīd, Abū Saʿīd's wife, and possibly also 2 women (slaves?) named Aqrān and ʿAlam. They are behaving in a high-handed way in the hoarding of money, saying things that shouldn't be said, and something involving timber. Concludes with a lengthy curse on anybody who comes into possession of this petition and fails to convey it to al-ʿĀdil and apprise him of its contents. Ed. Tamer el-Leithy, Marina Rustow and Naïm Vanthieghem (December 2016). (Information from TL, MR, NV, AA, and ASE.)

Verso (original use): Petition in Arabic script. Somewhat rudimentary hand. Possibly to the caliph himself (al-ḥaḍra al-ṭāhira). The sender desires to be sent to Syria to fight (raghiba al-jihād) with the victorious army (...wa-yatajarrad ilā al-Shām fī jumlat al-ʿaskar al-manṣūr wa-yabdhul majhūdahu fī al-khidma al-sharīfa...). The addressee is asked to issue an order to the Kātib al-Jaysh ordering his deployment (tajrīd). Recto (secondary use): Informal note in Arabic script confirming the granting of a gift without any conditions.

Recto: Hebrew biblical verses. Verso: State document, Fatimid period. Mentioned in S. M. Stern, "Cairo as a Centre of the Ismaili Movement."

State document, Fatimid period. Mentioned in S. M. Stern, "Cairo as a Centre of the Ismaili Movement."

State document. Petition to the caliph al-Mustanṣir regarding a murder on a boat. The son of the petitioner was traveling with a young merchant from Sirsinā to Fuwwa and then Alexandria on a boat carrying 500 dinars in cash and 200 dinars in goods, when the captain of the boat and the sailors robbed and murdered the two merchants. The petition asks that the caliph issue an edict to the lieutenants of the amīr Sinān Al-Dawla to place the captain and the sailors under arrest. Dating: ca. 427-487 AH (= 1036-1094 CE). (Information from CUDL)

State fiscal and administrative text from the Ayyubid period. Dated: 4 Rabīʿ II 595 AH, which is 1199 CE. Written in the form of a testimony. The document reports the execution of an order of the amir Qarāqūsh Bahāʾ al-Dīn b. ʿAbdallāh al-Asadī (d. 597/1201) to confiscate or recover a cache of 170 dinars (in gold coins) from a private house in possession of Ghānim b. ʿĪsā, one of the inhabitants of Upper Manūf. The order was carried out by the special commissioner of the amir, Fāris al-Dawla ʿAdī. The coins were placed in a purse and put under a wax seal and handed over to the commissioner. This operation is witnessed by ʿAmmār b. al-Ḥasan b. Ismaʿīl b. ʿAlī and Abū l-Maʿālī Yūsuf b. Muḥammad. At the time of this document, al-Malik al-Manṣūr, the son of al-Malik al-ʿAzīz, was titular sultan, with his uncle al-Malik al-Afḍal serving as regent. This is reflected in the two nisbas of the title al-Manṣūri and al-Afḍalī. On verso is a list of names in Arabic script that has no apparent connection with the document on recto. (Information from Khan and CUDL.)

State document. Petition to a Fatimid ruler in which the writer asks to be exempted from the payment of his capitation tax (of 1 + 1/3 + 1/4 dinars and a dirham), since lost his sight as a consequence of an eye illness and is now unable to perform his job, while the tax collectors are increasingly pressing. The writer also states that in the past he had been able to pay his capitation tax only thanks to the charitable intervention of the community. Dating: 12th century. On verso there is Hebrew text, possibly liturgical. (Information in part from CUDL.)

Fiscal document(s) in Arabic script. Bifolio. One entry on each page of recto. Might have to do with sugar. Apart from format and handwriting, we know it is state-related from terms such as al-maʿmūra, al-sulṭāniyya, and iṭlāq. Verso is almost blank apart from a few signatures on top of the lefthand page. Needs examination.

Petition addressed to a noble woman. In Arabic script. Written in two columns. The petitioner mentions bringing something to the treasury or a government warehouse (al-khizāna al-maʿmūra bi-dāʾim al-ʿizz) and asks for charity or at least a charitable act (al-ṣadaqa). On verso there is a very faded text in Hebrew (a prayer?).

Petition to a Fatimid dignitary concerning (or from?) a certain Abū l-Faraj apparently regarding various properties in a neighborhood (and perhaps their commandeering?). Subsidiary to the main request: "...to my lord the glorious shaykh, may God make his exaltation endure, belongs the lofty resolution concerning the use of the servant’s provisions, if what they contain should be of help to him..." (wa-li-mawlāya al-shaykh al-jalīl adāma allāh ʿuluwwahu ʿālī al-raʾy fī ightinām maʾūnat ʿabdihi in kāna mā yataḥaṣṣa fīhā ʿāyidan ʿalā ʿawnihi). (Khan, ALAD, p.316n46; also mentioned in "Historical Development," p.19.) There are also two lines at the bottom from a unrelated, unidentified document in Arabic script—perhaps a letter. The two documents were glued together by a Jewish scribe, who reused verso for Hebrew liturgy.

Official report (or just a letter). Probably a draft. Written in 4 columns on a bifolio, with many lines crossed out and some of the margins filled in. Mentions Constantinople and the faqīh Abū Ṭālib on the left page of recto, line 2. The individual sections begin with the word "wa-yunhī" and end with "anhā al-mamlūk dhālika" (e.g. left page of recto, line 8). Needs examination.

Petition from a group of people to al-ʿĀḍid (cf. formulae in T-S Ar.51.107). Mentions iqṭāʿāt and muqṭaʿīn, several place names, the ṣāḥib al-ḥarb in al-Maḥalla and how the Maghribīs sought the expulsion of the petitioners from their iqṭāʿāt (fa-lammā uqṭiʿat al-mamālīk rāmū l-maghāriba ikhrājhum). On verso there is a Hebrew liturgical poem; strophes interspersed with reference to a refrain. Needs further examination. (Information in part from FGP)

State document: On verso, titulature in calligraphic script, including al-khilāfa al-fāṭimiyya, which is rare (maybe hapax) in documentary texts.