Letter: ENA 2727.56

Description

Letter from Avraham b. Moshe b. Avraham b. Yosef b. Avraham to a dignitary called Avraham b. Abū l-Faḍl. In Judaeo-Arabic. The overall appearance and style is unusual, and it is unclear where it was sent from—evidently somewhere connected by caravan to Egypt. The sender is pained at the lack of letters "to our council" (li-majlisnā). The community is in distress over somebody named [...] b. Qalīl(?) known as Ibn Sīdū(?) and a sum of money. Also mentions a gift and business deals. The addressee should send his response with Ḥusayn or [...] with "this caravan when it returns." Greetings to "all of the scholars (al-ʿulamāʾ) and cantors and teachers, and the whole community. The fragment is very crumpled and more text will probably be legible if the creases are straightened out. On the back there looks like there are two legal entries with signatures, dealing with monetary matters. The first involves Abū ʿAlī b. Manṣūr Ibn ʿUwayja (בן עויגה) who had some dealing with the same Avraham b. Abū l-Faḍl the Aluf "mentioned inside of this letter." Signed by Shemuel b. Yeshuʿa and Yeshuʿa b. Abū [...] [known as] בן נאכויה. This is followed by another entry which is hard to read. Mentions 4 dinars and is signed by Moshe b. Abū l-Ḥasan, ʿIwaḍ b. ʿEli, and Yaʿaqov b. ʿEli.