Type: Letter

10477 records found
Letter in Judaeo Arabic, fragment. "I received 90 dirhams, the price of the two ublūjas (cones)... Yosef the son of the physician (ibn al-ḥakīm) did not find me in Tūnis... sold them and sent me their price, 90 dirhams...." The sender then mentions his grief at the news of the death of the husband of his daughter Najmiyya, and his sorrow was worsened by the fact that they did not tell him the cause of death.
Verso (probably original use): fragment of a letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Small vertical strip from the left side. Mentions [...]m b. Yiṣḥaq and niṣāfī (a kind of garment). Recto (probably secondary use): accounts in Arabic script and Greek/Coptic numerals
Recto: Letter in Arabic script. Two pieces of paper were glued together. Addressed to a qāḍī. The introductory portion ends with a ḥamdala, ṣalwala, and ḥasbala. Then the substance of the letter begins two lines from the bottom. Needs examination.
Verso, with the address on recto: Letter from Yaʿaqov b. Salmān, in Alexandria, to his sister, in Qayrawān. In Judaeo-Arabic, with the address written in both Judaeo-Arabic and Arabic script. Dating: ca. 1050 CE. The writer describes his fortunes ever since arriving in Egypt, including his month-long illness in Fustat, which exhausted much of his capital. But he was able to recuperate from the illness and enter business again. He is now torn between whether he should bring his flax merchandise to al-Mahdiyya or al-Lādhiqiyya, or whether he should return to Fustat to take a job with Abū l-Faraj b. 'Allān. He refers to his wife as "the mistress of my heart," and to his daughter as Sutayt (little mistress). This letter ought to be read together with Mosseri IIIa.11, written by the same writer to his mother (ed. Gil, Ishmael, #661). Gil published eight other letters by the same writer: Palestine, III, #506–07 and and Kingdom, IV, #660–65. Information in part from Goitein's index cards. ASE.
Memorandum (tadhkira) involving bringing something to Fustat, mentioning the name Abu Sa'd, on the back of a page of a literary work on the geology of stones written by Abu Yosef Ya'qub b. Imran.
Petition in Judaeo-Arabic from Yaʿqūb b. Abū l-Yaman to the Nagid. The writer was sick for 8 months and is hiding at home because of the capitation tax. Now a holiday is approaching and he is asking for help. On the back is a short account.
Letter in Judaeo-Arabic which seems to be an Arabic poem about dealing with the sultan. On the back is the name Yosef b. Avraham written twice.
Letter/panegyric in rhymed Hebrew. Full of flatter for the addressee and pious phrases. On the back (written in a different hand), a name is mentioned twice: Yefet al-Sharābi (preceded by the greeting ḥayyāk Allāh).
Letter from Yisrael b. Natan, Jerusalem, to Nahray b. Nissim, Fustat. Yisrael suggests Nahariyya to get out of a deal he made and asks for money to buy clothes. The letter includes the news that the "Rosh" - Daniel b. Azarya is coming to Jerusalem, via Nablus, and about his meeting with Eliyya ha-Kohen, son of Shelomo Gaon. August 24, 1052. VMR
Business letter in Judaeo-Arabic. Recto opens in the middle of an interesting story: "Six Venetian ships arrived, bearing great bounties (niʿam ʿaẓīma), and all of our 'companions' (aṣḥābnā) [who] arrived in them honored you. They made profit by supplying (tarābaḥū fī l-ziyāda) the Byzantines (al-Rūm) and brought about terrible results....: the Muʾminīs sold for 52 2/3 per 100, and the tutty(?) sold for 4 1/6 and a dāniq per ounce. The (value) which they supplied (zayyadū) to the Byzantines in this transaction and to the government was over 2,000 dinars, and all of it was to them. They completely ground the economy to a halt (? aksarū al-ḥāl jamīʿah), outside and inside, and all by the desire of 'our friend' (ṣāḥibnā), and how he does not turn a blind eye but rather demands that everything be as it should be. And not every person can tolerate the humiliation (dhilla) and treachery (jabīna). This is what happened. The saffron sold for 50 and 51...." Further down, mentions the mint (Dār al-Ḍarb) and gold. Verso mentions a young woman (al-ṣabiyya). Then, "When I received your excellence's dear letter, I stopped everything until receiving confirmation from you in this, and I went to him and rebuked him very much about this. His excuse was the matter of Ibn Yeshuʿa, until he should finish the work...." Then there is further explanation of this work which hasn't been done and how the craftsmen are idle. Goitien summarizes recto, "A group of merchants connived with the (Jewish) Rūm, so that only the latter and the government made great profits." There is also Goitein's partial handwritten transcription and notes in the attached documents. The word מומניה is difficult; Goitein suggests but doubts maʾmūniyya (=rice porridge or almond ḥalwa) and then wonders if it could be a variant of mūmiyāʾ (pissasphalt, "mummy"), but this too would be a strange way of writing it. A third possibility which Goitein does not mention—it may refer to the Muʾminī dinars minted by ʿAbd al-Muʾmin, the founder of the Almohad dynasty, and this exchange rate of 52.67:100 would be plausible based on information from Ibn Jubayr (e.g. https://shamela.ws/book/11203/26). If this is the correct reading, the letter probably dates to around the second half of the 12th century.
Address of a letter from Thābit b. Hibatallāh to the amir Asad al-Dawla [wa-Man?]ṣuruhā al-Juyūshī al-Afḍalī. In Arabic script. This was reused for Hebrew text (Psalms) on recto. The name Yosef b. Elʿazar also appears in Hebrew script on verso.
Letter of thanks from Manṣūr to Khalaf. In Judaeo-Arabic with the address in Arabic script.
Letter from Al-Mubārak b. Yiṣḥaq Ibn Sabra to his "father" (paternal uncle?) Abū l-Ḥasan Surūr b. Ḥayyim Ibn Sabra. He reports that Ibn Siman Ṭov (בן סימנטב) arrived and told him that the addressee had purchased a sack (tillīs) of wheat for 7 dinars, which saddened him, because Mubārak could have gotten him 2 sacks of superior wheat from his supply in Tinnīs. Indeed, Mubārak is struggling financially, and that would have helped him. He has been worrying so much about his goods in Tinnīs that he suffered an attack of yellow bile and broke out in pustules (fa-min kuthrat mā ḥamaltu ʿalā qalbī laḥaqanī khulṭ ṣafrāwī wa-ṭalaʿa ʿalayya bathr). People are in state of fear due to an unspecified situation. Mubārak had sent a letter with Maymūn al-Maghribī concerning garments that the addressee is supposed to send, because he hasn't even been able to afford a שראשי(?) to wear. He hasn't gone to the synagogue for several Shabbats (it seems due to his financial straits and lack of decent clothing). ASE
Letter from Khalfa to his 'brother' (brother-in-law?) Mūsā b. Sāmiḥ, in Cairo. Concerning various family matters. (1) No answer to letters. (2) Abū l-Faḍl came and informed the sender about the death of the little boy. (3) "My brother, I do not need to urge you concerning my sister... for I know that her character is difficult (akhlāqhā ṣaʿba)." She had not received her farḍ (a part in an inheritance, or perhaps alimony). (4) Mardūk brought the מסדיה but the אמשאט were impossible. (5) Greetings to Abū ʿImrān, the wife of the sender's maternal uncle, Abū Naṣr, Faḍā'il, Shibl, and Bū Saʿd. Abū Saʿd. (Information in part from Goitein's index card)
Letter in Judaeo-Arabic from a father to his sons, from India Book VII, 60 (unpublished). Note that Goitein calls this manuscript ENA 2739.16 in Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders.
Letter in the hand of Daniel b. Azarya, ca. 1051-1062.
Letter in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe to his brother Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment (left side of recto). Mentions: giving or paying something to Yaʿaqov; the testimonies (al-shahādāt... shahādāt kathīr mukhtalifa...); an urging not to forget to add the validation (qiyyum), presumably on the same testimonies; the price of mandrake root (luʿāb); and Khalaf al-[...].
Letter in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe probably sent to his brother Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment (lower right corner of recto). Refers to a shipwreck (cf. ENA NS 77.148, which isn't a direct join) and two people who survived (Khulayf and Ibn ʿŪdī). Regards to Sitt Naʿīm (Ḥalfon's wife).
Letter in the hand of Yefet b. Menashshe to his brother Ḥalfon b. Menashshe. In Judaeo-Arabic. Fragment (upper left corner of recto). Mentions: dirhams; that Yaʿaqov has departed for Fustat; a Kirmānī commodity (indigo?); that Saʿīd b. Hiba will sell something for Ḥalfon; a commodity that is selling for 30 dinars a mann; and possibly cumin.
Letter from Moshe Barukh. In Hebrew. Dating: Late, probably 15th–17th century. Asking for monetary assistance.