Legal document: T-S 16.159

Description

Deed of release. Location: Fustat. Dated: Tuesday, 15 Kislev 1526 Seleucid = 19 November 1214 CE, under the authority of Avraham Maimonides. This partnership release describes itself using the Aramaic term "tavra", referring to the "breaking" of the partnership relationship and a renunciation of further claims. Abū l-Bahāʾ b. Abū l-Ḥasan al-Dalātī Ibn al-Naḥḥāl (the beekeeper) releases his nephew Moshe ha-Kohen from all obligations resulting from "all of the joint enterprises (muʿāmalāt) which were between us from the beginning of time until now", as well as any concomitant oaths. Any further details of this family partnership are not included in the release. Goitein identifies three other financial documents between Abū l-Bahāʾ and Moshe, all of which concern loans from Moshe to his uncle. That the present document is dated between the dates of two of these documents suggests that despite this document ending a partnership, their mutual financial dealings continued. As the other documents are all concerned with the repayment of loans from Moshe to his uncle, it seems likely that Moshe was the source of capital for this partnership, and one of their "mutual dealings" was an investment partnership. Presumably Moshe would have released his uncle from any further claims in a separate document. (Information in part from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture," 135.)