State document: ENA NS 36.4

Description

Petition copy or draft in Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: likely early 17th century. The document is difficult to understand, as the first page is missing, and the pronouns are not clearly defined. It seems to be discussing two men - one is a dhimmī man named Natan, who is poor and oppressed, and the addressee (the sultan?) is asked to help him (r1–3 and v5–10). The other is a man who is very rich but pretends to be poor in order to evade paying what is owed to the government (māl al-sulṭān). It seems that the rich man is the subject of the document from r4–v4, then again v11–14. Natan's father was apparently the tax farmer (ʿāmil) of al-Khaḍra, and Natan's mother left a large inheritance of 200,000 medins, however it seems the rich man has gotten his hands on the inheritance, simultaneously defrauding the government and leaving Natan impoverished. Previously, "our master" Hafız Ahmed Pasha / Ḥāfiẓ Aḥmad Bāsha (the governor of Egypt 1590–94), and, later, "our master" Hızır Pasha / Khiḍr Bāsha (the governor of Egypt 1598–1601) managed to extract some money from this man. Both of the governors appear to be described as viziers ("X al-wazīr"). The document goes on to describe the sources of wealth of the rich man and his family members and associates. On verso (ll. 7–8), it states that the poor man should be helped, because he wishes to "leave the religion of unbelievers" and convert to "the noble (religion of) Islam." The addressee is asked to issue an order to the wālī to "seal up the house" of the rich man and arrest his family members and associates in order to secure the money of the government. The phrase "al-islām al-sharīf" suggests that either the sender and addressee are both Jewish converts to Islam (because this is a Judaeo-Arabic document), or (more likely) this is a transcription or draft made by a Jewish scribe of an Arabic petition written by a Muslim. Alternatively, the original document could be an Ottoman Turkish petition, and here it is being translated or paraphrased into Arabic; the phrase בייורך שריפ̇ = بويورڭ شريف = buyurun (khaṭṭ-ı) şerîf in verso, l. 11, is particularly intriguing as the key word is Turkish rather than Arabic.