Legal document: Yevr.-Arab. II 1625

Description

Legal document regarding the transfer of marital payments and trousseau items between David known as Naqāsh, father of the bride ʿAzīza, and the groom Shalom b. Ya'aqov Levi. Dated 18 Elul 5520 AM (1760 CE). The document was recorded in the home of Nissīm b. Yaʿaqov Levi aka Qayyīm (possibly the groom's brother). The sums of money include 50 dirham for the ʿiqar payment and 30 riyyal + 200 medin for the mohar. The bride's surname is not written definitively but might be inferred as Levi because line 5 notes that David aka Naqāsh transfers payments to "his brother" Nissīm, the owner of the home where the document was recorded. It is, therefore, plausible that the bride and groom are related as niece–paternal uncle. Further research is necessary to determine whether brothers from the same nuclear family could have differing familial nicknames (Qayyīm v.s. Naqāsh). It is crucial to note that "brother" or "our brother" was commonly used on a formulaic level throughout many early modern Karaite legal documents for unrelated male members of the community ([אחי[נו] ואהו[בינו). For contemporary evidence of the uniformity of nicknames across extended families, see for example: Feyrūz aka Revaḥ in Yevr.-Arab. II 1563, Yevr.-Arab. II 1424, Yevr. II A 1285, Yevr.-Arab. II 1628. MCD.