Geniza Lab

Affidavit of a loan by Berakhot b. Yosef to Perahyah b. Adahay signed by Judge Eliyyahu in 1220-- see Goitein Nachlass material

Legal document mentioning [...] b. Ḥayyim Nafūsī. Scribed and signed by Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Also signed by Avraham b. Shemaʿya and Yiṣḥaq b. Shemuel ha-Sefaradi and ʿEli ha-Kohen ha-[...].

Query about niddah submitted to Abraham Maimuni by Shelomo b. Eliyyahu-- see Goitein Nachlass material

Formulary for a legal document of ḥaliẓa (rejection of levirate marriage). On vellum.

Legal fragment from a marriage document. Needs examination

Marriage contract (ketubba). On parchment. Long vertical fragment, 21 in. in height; looks like a backbone. Written and signed by the cantor Hillel b. ʿEli. Location: Fustat. Dated: Sivan, 139[.] Seleucid, which is 1068–79 CE. (Information from Goitein’s index card)

Court deposition. The widow Salāma bt. Furayj b. Abī l-Gharīb appoints the Baghdādī Ḥasan/Yefet b. Ṭoviyya/Ṭayyib as her attorney to claim anything due to her late husband Natan/Hiba b. Ḥakam b. Yosef b. Shumaym ha-Levi, and authorizes the expenditure of money, up to 17 dinars, for the transport of her husband's body to Jerusalem. (Information from Goitein's index card.)

Deed of sale for the sale of a female slave. Location: Fustat. Dated: Tuesday, 1 Nisan 1537 Seleucid, which is 31 March 1226 CE, under the authority of Avraham Maimonides. This is a copy of T-S 13J4.2. Yiṣḥaq b. Yehuda Ibn al-Mashshāṭ, agent (wakīl) of Yeshuʿa b. Hillel Ibn Zikr, sells to Hillel b. Barakāt the female slave Ḍiyāʾ, who was born into slavery (muwallad) and was brought (musayyara) to Fustat. Price: 25 dinars. Not signed. Seems to be a (good) copy made by Shelomo b. Eliyyahu. (Information from Mediterranean Society, I, pp. 433, 458, and from Goitein's index cards)

Legal notes notarized by Shelomo b. Eliyyahu. Dating: Early 13th century. (1) Location: New Cairo. Shelomo b. Yiṣḥaq had paid 30 dinars and Abū l-Faḍāʾil b. Abū l-Barakāt 52 dirhams into a partnership. It was agreed that Shelomo, who was also the agent, would take 23 parts and Abū l-Faḍāʾil only 1/24. Shelomo had left the whole sum in Qūṣ and takes responsibility for the whole sum of the money or its equivalent. (2) Yaḥyā ("ha-Sar ha-Yaqar") receives from Shela b. Berakhot 3000 dirhams as loan. No additional details. (3) The same two men each produced 600 dirhams, each for a partnership to last a year. At the bottom of verso there are additional notes (accounting?) in Judaeo-Arabic, Arabic script, and Greek/Coptic numerals. Mentions Bū l-Khayr al-Nafīs. (Information from Goitein's attached notes.)

Deposition made in court, under duress. Dating: ca. 1130s–40s CE. The issue concerns a house worth 300 dinars; 150 were paid. Then it was estimated as being worth 270 dinars; 100 were paid, and someone had to pay another 10. Threats were made by the nephew Munajjā b. Sulaymān/Shelomo. There is a complicated issue of inheritance and heirs who had converted to Islam ("poshʿim"). Goitein notes that the nephew Munajjā b. Shelomo signed T-S 13J3.6 in 1145 CE (but this shelfmark does not appear to be correct). Munajjā b. Shelomo also signed T-S 8J7.6 together with Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. (Information in part from Goitein’s index card.)

Marriage contract (ketubba). Fragment (left side only). In the hand of Natan b. Shemuel. Location: Fustat. Dated: [14]66 Seleucid, which is 1144/45 CE. Groom: Avraham b. Abū l-Faraj. Bride: ʿAdhb. Marriage payments: 1 + 1 = 2. No dowry. Signed by Natan b. Yaḥyā. (Information from Goitein’s index card.)

Legal document. Partnership dissolution. Dated: 1152. Location: Fustat. Under the authority of the Nagid Shemuel b. Ḥananya. Hiba al-Abzārī b. Abū Isḥaq al-Tawwazī and Abū l-Faḍāʾil Yaʿqūb al-Raffāʾ release one another from a partnership, leaving Hiba owing Abū l-Faḍāʾil 6 dinars, to be repaid according to a schedule. The separation of the partners also leaves the two partners returning what seems to be a debt to their investor Abū l-Ḥasan Ibn al-ʿUrs; Hiba will pay 60-70 dinars and Abū l-Faḍāʾil will pay 13 dinars. Interestingly, each of the partners is left with a separate debt to Abū l-Ḥasan, distinct from the assets of his partner; thus, following the separation, the parties are no longer jointly liable even for debts which were accrued during the life of the partnership. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture", pp. 279-280; Jacob Mann, "The Jews in Egypt and in Palestine under the Fatimid Caliphs," 1:230, 2:237; and Goitein's index cards.)

Marriage contract (ketubba). Location: Fustat. Dated: Kislev 1414 Seleucid, which is 1112 CE. Groom: Meshullam b. David. Bride: Sutūt bt. Ṭahor, the divorcee of Yefet b. Khiyār. Marriage payments: 1 + 3 = 4. No trousseau. At the very end: "she produced her geṭ and we tore it." Witnesses: Elʿazar b. Ghālib; Yiṣḥaq b. Aharon ha-Kohen; Yiṣḥaq b. Shemuel; Moshe b. Aharon ha-Kohen; Sason b. [...]. (Information in part from Goitein’s index card.)

Legal document. Partnership record. Dated: October 1039.Location: Cairo. In April 1039, the parties Tuviyah b. Yefet ha-Levi and ‘Allūn b. Faraj (and perhaps Salāma ha-Kohen b. Nissan) came to the home of Suleymān b. Isḥāq b. Meir in Cairo. Suleymān was involved in a partnership (mufāwaḍa) with Tuviyah and ‘Allūn. The other partner to the agreement is Khalaf b. Ibrāhīm. When Tuviyah and ‘Allūn demand a payout from the partnership, to be distributed by Suleymān (evidently the senior partner), Suleymān disputes this, explaining that Tuviyah and ‘Allūn have received their final settlements, and Khalaf is free from his obligations to them. Suleymān and Khalaf terminate their relationship, and the April document is given to Khalaf as proof. ‘Allūn's attestation that Suleymān and Khalaf had “a joint enterprise (mu‘āmala) and not a qinyan”, complicating the understanding of partnership models in this period; the difference between a mufāwaḍa and a mu‘āmala (or between either of these and a qinyan) is unclear Immediately below, in different handwriting, appears the testimony of Salāma b. Nissan ha-Kohen to Suleymān that he (Salama) has made the same statement in a different location, at the home of an elder. Goitein believed that the Khalaf b. Ibrahīm mentioned in this document was the same one that appeared in T-S 18J1.6 (PGPID 3523); Lieberman disputes this. In yet another handwriting, the document validates the signatures of Tuviyah and ‘Allūn in the permanent court in Fusṭāṭ some months after their initial testimony was recorded in the home of Suleymān in Cairo. The signatories are the three judges Efrayim b. Shemarya, Avraham b. Mevaser, and Yefet ha-Ḥazan b. David. (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture", 281-284)

Legal query to Avraham Maimonides regarding a man who takes a 200 dinar loan and appoints his parents as guarantors, providing them with a house on his property equivalent in value to his debt. Over the course of the ten-year period of the loan, the debtor marries a woman in Egypt and then travels to India, leaving her in Egypt. When the ten-year period comes to a close and the debt has not been repaid, the creditors wish to sell the house on the property to recoup their funds. The question facing Avraham Maimonides is whether the wife who remained in Egypt has the authority to prevent the sale. Old IB number: 169. New IB number: VII, 31. (Nathaniel Moses)

Letter from Musa b Ya'qub, Tyre, to Abu al-'Ala Yusuf b. Daud b. Sha'ya, Fustat. NB shelfmark was incorrect in old PGP (Or. 1082 J42 instead of Or. 1080 J42)

Power of attorney to receive four dinars from Abu al-Muna, given by Yakhin b. Elazar of Minyat Zifta to Yosef al-Miqdasi b. Allun. (Information from Goitein's index cards)

Legal document. Scribed and witnessed by Hillel b. ʿEli. Location: Fustat. Dated: Sunday 10 Tevet 13[..] Seleucid. The body of the document mentions a divorce that took place in Kislev 1393 Seleucid, which is December 1081 CE. The document itself was therefore drawn up between 1081/82 and 1087/88 CE. The case involves Barakāt b. Mubārak al-Tinnīsī and Ḥisāna bt. Ibrāhīm. Concerns the alimonies (two waybas of wheat, etc., per month) of a widow who was free from her obligations. It appears to be a summary of the court's ruling, and there is a note at the bottom, "We, the court/judges, received this copy and the copy of the original, and...." The former husband was from Tinnīs, and the witnesses were people from Palestine and Syria, and other foreigners. (Information from Goitein’s index card)

Recto: Letter of recommendation addressed to Aharon ha-Ḥazzan. In Hebrew, calligraphically written. Headed with the title 'Rosh ha-Seder.' Requesting that Aharon look after a blind man named Shabbat who claimed to have been cheated of his allocation. Verso: A woman pawns pieces of her trousseau against loans. The date 26 May 1050 CE appears in lines 4–5. Information from Goitein's note cards. Old description: Fragments of responsum by a Gaon, dealing with children of female slaves.

Court record containing a complete list of items of a trousseau (without prices) returned to Sitt al-Hasab on the order of the Nagid. Dated Tishri 1458/ September 1146. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, p. 386)