Geniza Lab

Draft of letter from Natan ha-Kohen ha-Mumhe b. Mevorakh, Ashkelon, to Eli ha-Kohen ha-Parnas b. Hayyim, Fustat.

Letter addressed to Abū ʿAlī Aharon ha-Kohen b. Avraham. In Hebrew and Judaeo-Arabic, and quite eloquent. The addressee and his father have long strings of titles. Recto is entirely introductory blessings. The writer continues on verso with a strong rebuke for the lack of letters, especially because he has suffered "illnesses like no one has ever suffered before." He justifies his rebuke with an (unattributed) quote from Kitāb al-Zahra, the treatise on love by the 10th-century Muslim jurist Muḥammad b. Dāwūd al-Ẓāhirī: "Without rebuking lapses, one can't preserve a friendship." The writer sends regards to Abū ʿImrān, who he fears is mad at him and wants to cut off their correspondence, because he hasn't responded to the writer's letters. Regards to Abū Saʿīd as well, and a nice astronomical blessing: פלא זאלת אפלאך עלוהא דאירה ושמס עזהא נאירה וכואכב סעדהא סאירה. ASE

Letter from unknown writer, unknown location, to his 'brother,' in Fustat. The address is almost entirely gone, but one of them is named Bū Saʿd. Everyone who comes from Fustat has been telling the writer that the shop is closed. He is further worried because he doesn't know if al-Rayyis Barakāt actually delivered the garments (awsāṭ and an ʿarḍī), because Barakāt said that he found the addressee spending the evenings at Dār al-Bayḍ (or Bīḍ?), but the writer doesn't believe him. The writer wants an urgent letter with news of the awsāṭ and of his mother "because there is no terrible news (khabar muqārab) but that I have imagined it, and life and death are in the hands of God." The addressee should try to sell some of the garments, including a blue ʿarḍī, for 2 dinars (there is then a slightly cryptic line about an inheritance and what if something should happen to the old woman). The 2 dinars should be deposited with Abū ʿAlī or with the writer's cousin (ibn ʿamma) and the remainder should be sent to the writer. "Do not think that I am writing to you about this because I am going to travel anywhere. By the Law, my only travel is to al-Maḥalla and to Fustat, and it crossed my mind that I should come up to Fustat, and only this is holding me back." The letter ends surʿa surʿa surʿa (=hurry hurry hurry!!!). ASE

Letter from Avraham b. Abī l-Ḥayy, in Alexandria, to his brother Mūsā, presumably in Fustat. Dating: ca. 1075 CE, several months after the death of their father. Avraham describes his financial difficulties, as he depends on the wheat that Mūsā sends him. Evidently Mūsā has been instructing Abū l-Ḥasan ʿAllūn to send Avraham wheat only once a month. Apart from that, he works hard as a teacher. Avraham's wife insults him because he is unable to support his family. His woes are such that "I fear that I will develop a serious illness, for I no longer have the wherewithal to bear the preoccupation of my heart" (r14–15). He expresses his willing to come to Fustat but he has no company for his travels and he is worried about the tax collectors in Fustat. Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 3, #471. VMR. ASE.

Letter from Nahray b. Nissim to Ayyash b. Sadaqa in Busir. Probably ca. 1050.

Letter from Yaʿqūb b. Ismaʿīl al-Andalusī, in Tunisia or Sicily (Goitein) or Tyre (Gil), to Abū l-Walīd Yūnus b. Dāʾūd b. Zablān, probably in Fustat. Dating: ca. 1060 CE. The sender seems to be a business agent for the addressee. Deals with various shipments of commodities, some of which were sent together with merchandise for Nahray b. Nissim. (Information from Gil and from Goitein’s index card.)

Letter sent from Alexandria by Yiṣḥaq Nisaburi to Abu al-'Ala Sa'id b. Munajja in Fustat, asking him to send a Byzantine scribe to Alexandria to write a Torah scroll. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Letter addressed to Abū Sahl ha-Levi (the cantor of the Palestinian synagogue in Fustat, who died in 1211), with greetings also to his brothers Moshe and Abū ʿImrān. The identity of the writer is not clear. S. M. Stern identified this as an autograph of Maimonides, but it is not a perfect match The remainder of the writer's name might appear at the upper left of recto: possibly B[ū Zi]kr[ī]? The ductus and the overall appearance is similar to several letters of the physician Abū Zikrī b. Eliyyahu, but again, the handwriting is not a perfect match. The writer excuses his failure to write on account of an illness, and a little later, "As for your failure to write to me: I had an excuse, but you have no excuse!" There is not a great deal of content to this letter beyond the good wishes and urging a response. It is valuable, though, for the clear identification of Abū Sahl's brothers as Moshe and Abū ʿImrān. ASE

Letter from Yehuda b. Moshe ibn Sighmār, in Alexandria, to ʿEli ha-Kohen b. Yaḥyā (aka Ḥayyim) the parnas, in Fustat. Yehuda explains the problems he has been having collecting monies owed him by a 'partner,' Abū Isḥāq Avraham b. Faraj al-Raḥbī, having to do with the sale of a valuable piece of ambergris. He has heard that Abū Isḥāq is now in Fustat, but he cannot come in person due to an eye disease (recto, margin, ll. 1–2). He requests that ʿEli represent him in litigation against that person. He has enclosed a power of attorney with his letter. Ed. Cohen, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, 56 (2013), pp. 218–63. Also published by Moshe Gil, Kingdom, IV, #622 (pp. 58–66). See also the power of attorney dated 1085 CE, Bodl. MS heb. c 28/11, published in both publications. See also Goitein's note card #27115. ASE.

Letter from Efrayim b. ʿAzaryahu to an unnamed addressee. There are 13 lines of eloquent Hebrew blessings and flattery ("my soul is tied up with your soul"), calligraphically written and even vocalized. In the final three lines he gets to the point: "Please liberate my quarter-dinar and give me dirhams for it, and let half of them be small pieces, may I never be deprived of your life." This is the end. Somewhere in Mediterranean Society, Goitein discusses the scarcity of small change. On verso there is a talmudic or halakhic text with a Judaeo-Arabic discussion.

Business letter sent from Alexandria by Abu al-Ḥasan b. Khulaif to Abu Sa'id al-'Afsi in Cairo about business done for him in Spain. (Information from Mediterranean Society, I, p. 166, and from Goitein's index cards.) See also DK 232.2 (alt: VIII), a letter sent to the same addressee from the Binyām mentioned in r8–10.

Letter by Akhlabu b. Aharon ha-Kohen from Alexandria to Yosef b. Eli ha-Kohen Fasi. The writer apologizes for not having accompanied the recipient on his way out of Alexandria; he thought that the ship would not sail in the stormy weather. The ship sailed, but had to make a stop in Abu Qir. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 4, p. 328)

Letter addressed to the Nagid Mevorakh b. Seʿadya, in Cairo (al-Qāhira al-maḥrūsa bi-l-ʿizz al-dā'im). In Hebrew. Only the introductory blessings and the address are preserved on this fragment. On verso there are writing exercises in a childish hand which consist of a pious phrase (אלנגאח עליה באלתקוא ואלצלאח).

Letter from the judge Eliyyahu, in the Sinai desert, to his son the physician Abū Zikri, in Jerusalem. Eliyyahu admonishes him to live in peace with his younger brother and to attend to various other matters. (Information from Goitein's index card) EMS and VMR

Letter from ʿOvadya ha-Kohen b. Iṣḥaq to his cousin and friend Abū Zikrī Yaḥyā ha-Kohen b. Yosef b. Yiftaḥ in Tinnīs, mentioning other kohanim. ʿOvadya ha-Kohen received some money from Abū Zikrī Yaḥyā ha-Kohen so that he could obtain certain books which a group or a family of kohanim in Tinnīs wanted to study. ʿOvadya ha-Kohen was unable to procure the requested books. Instead, he sent to Tinnīs three parts (quires?) of a Babylonia rite prayer book and Saʿadya Gaon’s commentaries on Job and Proverbs. He advised his friends to study these until he was able to find the books desired. (Information from Goitein notes and index card linked below, Goitein, MedSoc, Vol. 2, p. 194 and Goitein, Jewish Education in Muslim Countries, pp. 137-138.)

Family letter from the end of the 12th century to Abu al-Faraj b. Abu al-Barakāt, a doctor in Fustat, from his brother in Alexandria. The letter mentions forceful collection of the capitation tax (jaliya) in Alexandria. (Information from Frenkel. See also Goitein, MEd. Soc. 2:372, 2:372, and 4:61. Goitein describes the document as following: Family letter from a physician in Alexandria to his brother, also a physician, who had traveled to Fustat without having paid his poll-tax (or having forgotten to send the receipt back). The writer had to pay a certain sum every day to the Muslim authorities (tarsim) until he would pay the poll-tax for his brother. After two days of refusing to do so, he was confined to prison and paid the poll-tax.

Letter from Yosef b. Yeshuʿa, in Tripoli (Syria), to Nahray b. Nissim. The letter mentions Nahray's pilgrimage to Jerusalem and shipments of emblic myrobalan and frankincense. A certain old woman has gone blind in one eye, and the other eye is in danger, so Yosef asks Nahray to send him tutty (zinc oxide) or whatever else might be beneficial.

Letter from Yosef ha-Kohen b. Meshullam, in Aden, to Avraham Ibn Yiju, in inland Yemen, written around 1150-51.

Shelomo b. Eliyyahu asks Dā'ūd b. Yehuda ha-Kohen to read out a letter of condolence—enclosed with the present letter—to Moshe ha-Kohen and his son Salāma in Malīj. He excuses himself from traveling due to his illnesses. Shelomo sends his regards to his sister Sitt al-Riyāsa and her siblings and her mother.

India Book I, 13: Draft of a letter from Yosef Lebdi, the India trader, to Ḥasan b. Bundar, 'the representative of merchants' in Aden, dealing with the dispute between Yosef ha-Lebdi and Yequtiʾel b. Moshe, 'the representative of merchants' in Fustat. This letter, as Lebdi makes clear, was composed under the instructions of the court of Fustat. Lebdi informs the recipient that the court has instructed him to write to Aden and request an official account, approved in court, of the dealings made with Yequtiʾel's share of the property. The letter can be dated to 1098 and was written in the hand of Hillel b. Eli. The letter begins in the verso of Bodl. MS Heb d 66/66 and then continues to Bodl. MS Heb d 66/67 (recto and then verso).