Geniza Lab

Letter in Arabic script. Some kind of (state?) report on agricultural activities this year? وقد زرع في هذه السنة... وجميع الفلاحين فيها فلاحين السلطان... احد العسكرية هذا سوا ما يزرع فيها من الارز... باطلاق عمارة في الضياع ال... وانكشفت جميع الناس. On verso there is a Hebrew literary text (as well as between the lines on Bodl. MS heb. f 107/34).

Letter in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. Addressed to someone important, possibly the Nagid, and possibly specifically Maṣliaḥ Gaon (based on some flattering phrases that also appear in other letters to Maṣliaḥ). He is writing to seek help on behalf of a man named Isḥāq b. T[hābit?] who has been arrested.

Letter of appeal for charity. In Judaeo-Arabic. The writer needs help paying the capitation tax (jāliya). The addressee had previously said something about talking to Peraḥya b. Nissim and raising funds from the community.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Signed, formally, by Aharon b. Avraham and Avraham b. Mevorakh. Probably addressed to the Nagid (al-rayyis, ra's al-mathība). It may concern a man who was insulting people and challenging the writers' authority. But it is very faded and only the bottom part is preserved. Needs further examination.

Letter in Judaeo-Arabic. From several people, probably addressed to Sayyidnā al-Rayyis. The senders are currently being held in prison and it sounds like they are making their case to the addressee to exert himself to help them. They had evidently antagonized some man in a legal battle. This man then showed up drunk to a gathering and attacked them and insulted them and tried to smash jars of oil. When this didn't get him anywhere, he went to some government office (Dār al-Sulṭān) and cried out for help, "O Muslims! I do not say... the religion of Islam." They tried to appease him, but he said, "You 'wrote' (a contract?) in Muslim courts... I will take revenge on you!" The authorities responded to the ruckus by throwing everyone in prison. ASE

Fragments from a copy of a letter. The writer is a person from Pumbedita (which belongs to a family of several Gaons) to a person in Spain, might be Hisdai b. Shafrut. The copy from the 11th century. Original letter from March/April 953. The letter contains important details about the connections with Spain, as well as about main figures in the Iraqi yeshiva. Mentions the head of the Gola – Shlomo b. Yisha’ayahu. (Gil, Kingdom, vol. 2, Doc. #13) VMR

Copy of a letter from Shemuel Gaon b. Hofni to the community in Fez. The beginning of the 11th century, handwriting of Sahlan b. Avraham. Mentions tragic events that took place in Fez, including killing of community members and destroying of the synagogue. The writer sends his deep condolences. The letter was probably sent from Baghdad through Fustat and Sahlan copied parts of it. (Information from Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 2, #51) VMR

Letter from Nathan b. Abraham to one of his followers, October-November 1042. (FGP)

See PGP 19591

The physician Menahem writes to his colleague, the Nagid Avraham Maimonides, about happenings when he traveled to the village Tanan (in the Qalyubiyya district near Cairo) to sea a patient. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, p. 579)

Fragment of a report on measures taken to save pious foundations from the rapacity of the finance minister, known as 'the Monk'' (active 1127-1129). (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, 425, 426, 588)

Letter from Se’adya b. Yosef to his students in Fustat. Original letter was written in February or March 922. The date of this copy is unknown. Describes the events of summer and fall 921, when Se’adya was in Aleppo and heard about Aaron b. Meir’s intention to change the calendar. Also describes the Iraqi scholars’ opposition to his plans. Two pages (Bodl. MS Heb 56/82-83). (Gil, Kingdom, vol. 2, Doc. #6) VMR

Partially preserved 11th century copy three of three letters written by Saadya in the course of the 921-922 calendar controversy between Palestinians and Babylonians. There is an address in Arabic script. The letters are addressed to Saadya’s disciples Shelomo, Ezra and ʿEli in Fustat and recount the events of the Palestinian calendar declaration by Ben Meir and the Babylonian’s reaction to it. Saadya urges his addressees to uphold the dates of the Babylonians, and ensure that Jews do not eat leaven on Passover and desecrate the Day of Atonement. (Information from Rustow, Stern, The Jewish Calendar Controversy of 921-22, in Stern, S and Burnett, C, (eds.) Time, Astronomy, and Calendars in the Jewish Tradition. (pp. 79-95). Brill: Leiden, 2013. See also Gil, Kingdom, Vol. 2, p. 17 and Goitein notes linked below, and the Penn Catalog.)

See Bodl. MS heb. f 56/82

Letter fragment from Alexandria reporting that a woman stood security for her husband. The phrase 'tabri'at ketubba' appears. There are repeated references to "this great catastrophe" and various legal proceedings. (Information from Goitein's index cards) Description from PGPID 6547: See join for description. This portion of the letter awaits transcription.

Letter fragment. Addressed to a certain Abū Isḥāq Ibrāhīm. May belong together with the preceding fragments.

Letter fragment in Judaeo-Arabic. In fact there may be two documents here, written at 180 degrees to each other. (מע סכרה אלכביזה ואלדי ישהד אליה אבו אל...)

Letter in Arabic script. Opens with an ornate "al-izza lillāhi taʿālā." Addressed to al-amīr al-rayyis Abū l-Faḍāʾil. The letter gives instructions concerning business matters and possibly the dishonesty of a messenger. Reused on recto for piyyut.

Informal note addressed to 'the brother' R. Zekharya. In Judaeo-Arabic. (Is this Shelomo b. Eliyyahu writing to Abū Zikrī?) He asks him not to detain the old woman from coming, but rather to assist her in coming quickly, because the writer's wife ("al-ṣughayyira") is sick and they are perishing of isolation and "there is no one to fill a jug of water for us." ASE

Letter from Salama Ha-Kohen b. Yosef, Ramla, to Shema'ya Ha-Ḥaver b. Yeshu'a, Jerusalem, May 1054. Gil called this fragment "Chapira 1*" because it was published by Bernard (Eliezer Dov) Chapira in 1953. The fragment that bears the shelfmark Chapira 1 in FGP is unrelated to this one (even though the Gil reference appears in the bibliography), and to the best of our knowledge, the actual manuscript that Gil edited appears nowhere in FGP, by either shelfmark or image.