List or table: ENA 1822a.65

Description

Accounts in Hebrew, mentioning a khizana, treasury, seemingly a box in which all revenue was deposited and from which all expenditure was made. Dated in 1516 based on: Wednesday 11 Jumādā I תתקכב = 922. According to Goitein nothing like the "khizana" appears in documents from the classical Geniza period, which, he writes, reflects 'the cumbersome system of financing the social services [which] had its source partly in the general technical imperfections of medieval administrations. The accumulation of public funds in one treasury was to some extent avoided in order to preserve them from the overreaching of rapacious government officials.' Written in the Hebrew language, and the writer, although using that Arabic word and dating according to Muslim months, apparently was a European, to judge from his spelling of Arabic names. (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, p. 101 [date given on p. 543]). Perhaps better explained by the non-corporate nature of the community in those centuries, at least. This late document may reflect the custom of Jews from Europe, who were used to a more corporate form of organization. One side: assets (=left in the khizana); other side, payments (=I gave to), with recorded total of one thousand 186 dr. (dirhams) (Information from Cohen) NB: An alternate reading of the term in question on the recto and verso is the honorific title כואגה (khawaja)– which follows the format of many other entries in the document referring to individual people rather than collective finances. MCD