Legal query or responsum: T-S Misc.28.255

الوصف

Fragments of legal queries, possibly sent together as a single letter. Dating: 16th- or 17th-century (per Glick). Location: Siderokapısı/Sidrekapsi (סידריקאפס[י]), a mining town in what is now modern-day Greece, is mentioned on the lower right edge of the recto but the context is unclear due to the extensive damage. During the Ottoman period, Siderokapısı was home to a large Jewish population with hundreds of families (Minna Rozen, The Corvée of Operating the Mines in Siderokapısı, 37, 45). Location: one of the legal queries on T-S Misc.28.255 was sent from Adrianople (Edirne) by Avraham b. Moshe Sabrigo (שאבריגו) and Shemuʾel ha-Kohen on behalf of the city's Portuguese congregation. The legal query bears both their autographs. Another portion of the fragment contains a letter signed by a certain Yiṣḥaq ʿOvadya, who writes about several other legal queries that do not appear on T-S Misc.28.255 but possibly once comprised additional pages to the letter. Shemuel Glick identifies Yiṣḥaq ʿOvadya as potentially the same individual who published אגרת דופי הזמן in Venice in 1598– full text available at: https://hebrewbooks.org/52557 (Information from Shmuel Glick's description/edition in FGP) NB: Minna Rozen lists the location of Siderokapısı as "some eight kilometers southeast of Thessaloniki," but this geographical association does not seem possible (Rozen, The Corvée of Operating the Mines in Siderokapısı, 37). The mining town in question may have been much further east in the Chalkidiki peninsula, where the Ottoman "Siderokapısı" or "Sidrekapsi" mint was also located (possibly Stratoniki, Stratoni, or Sidiriolakkos). A map of this mint's location in Şevket Pamuk's work supports the latter locations as possible candidates: Pamuk, A Monetary History of the Ottoman Empire, 91. MCD.