وثيقة رسميّة: ENA 1822a.46

الوصف

Petition in Arabic script concerning a governor, a bishop and monasteries. In the formal third-person address, the writer apologizes for sending the request in writing instead of making it in person; his excuse is that he’s pressed for time since he’s currently studying (ḥadīth? jālis ilā) at the feet of a certain Ibn Ṣāʿ. Asks the addressee to write to the scribe of a Fatimid governor titled ʿAzīz al-Dawla with a request for two documents. The first document should be addressed to the bishop Binyāmīn of Ṭamwa (Dammūh), who is responsible for two monasteries, Shahrān (in Minyat al-Shammās) and Ḥilwān (also south of Cairo), “strengthening his hand,” presumably meaning reinforcing his authority over the monasteries' property; the second should be addressed to the overseer of Shahrān itself, both strengthening the hand of the bishop and establishing who owns the property that belongs to the two monasteries. (It is also possible that mutālaba refers to seeking legal redress against someone who has wrongfully appropriated the property.) The property in question may be waqf property or a land grant of the monasteries. The title of the governor, ending in al-dawla, dates the letter to the Fatimid period. The text also contains a taqbîl clause in which the petitioner kisses the hand of the addressee rather than the ground, so this puts it likely but not definitely in the late Fatimid period.