Legal document: T-S NS 320.75

Description

Legal document, perhaps a deed of release. In Hebrew, in a striking square script. Dating: Probably 10th or early 11th century. Involves Mevorakh b. Shabbat and perhaps his brother Faraj (last line). States that future claims will be void, "whether verbal or written, whether in Hebrew documents or Persian documents." Similar formulae also appear in 10th-century legal documents (e.g., T-S 16.56 and T-S 12.496, and there is a good chance that other languages were listed at the beginning of the next line of this document, which is missing). The document refers to the Gentile courts as בידואר and refers to the currency טרפעיקא that occasionally appears in the Talmud. It may be the only known document that refers to the טרפעיקא. Between the lines and on verso there is an unidentified text in Judaeo-Arabic that gives elaborate technical instructions. Based on the reference to "distillation" (taqṭīr), these are probably instructions for making perfume or alcohol, or at least some (al)chemical process. This fragment is uncited in the literature. (Information in part from Oded Zinger and Eve Krakowski.) ASE.