Letter: ENA 4100.24a

Description

Memorandum by the merchant Faraḥ b. ʿAyyāsh, it seems addressed to his agent "my master the Parnas," explaining the details of a lawsuit which the parnas is to bring against Mawhūb b. Saʿd due to the latter's failure to pay his share of the customs on a bale of caraway which was part of a partnership between Mawhūb and ʿEli b. Ḥasan(?) al-Wāsiṭī, who is somehow connected to Faraḥ (באבה פרח), in Safar 481 AH = April/May 1088 CE. Faraḥ paid his share of the customs on the bale in Tinnīs (2.75 dinars), which means that Mawhūb owes 1.375 dinars (apparently they are dividing expenses at a 2:1 ratio). Faraḥ and Abū l-ʿAlāʾ checked the ledger of the wakīl and found in it only the entry for the customs of Fustat; Abū l-ʿAlāʾ and Ṣāʿid can both testify to this. Then mentions Tripoli, Abū l-Riḍā, and the customs for a sack of starch (mikhlāt al-kathīrāʾ) and linen cloth (khaysha). Abū l-ʿAlāʾ apparently told Mawhūb to leave the 1.375 dinars in Fustat with Abū l-Khayr Ṣadaqa. Faraḥ "did not travel until I ordered Abū l-ʿAlāʾ to collect it from the wakīl." Concludes, "If you wish to see the ledger of the wakīl, go to my master the qāḍī Abū l-Qāsim. It is in his basket, and on it there is written a line in Hebrew script." ASE