Letter: ENA 2558.2

Description

Recto: Letter likely sent from Aden to Fustat. (The locations are not specified in the document; this is Goitein's assessment.) In Judaeo-Arabic, written in a Yemeni hand. Dated: 26 Adar 1530 Seleucid, which is 1219 CE. The sender wants mercury and Iraqi roses to be purchased with the proceeds from bamboo chalk (ṭabāshīr). He asks about the value of Yiṣḥaq's pepper and frankincense. ʿAṭiyya al-Dajjājī is to write with an update on the bag (kharīṭa) of aloeswood and the silk fūṭa. Greetings to al-Asʿad. This is document VII, 52 in India Book VII (unpublished). Verso: Draft of a letter written in Edessa (al-Ruhā). In Judaeo-Arabic. In a different hand than the letter on recto. The sender complains that he has been unemployed for 2.5 years, the first of which he spent in Tyre. Then (the French rabbi Yosef) b. Gershom arrived in ʿAkka, and terrible things happened.... (The fragment ends here.) Goitein suggests that this letter is a request for a post.