Letter: T-S Ar.42.130

Description

Letter from Ṣamṣām, a prisoner in Nāblus, to al-Qāʾid Muʿizz (according to the body of the letter) or to the heirs of Ṣārim al-Dawla, in Cairo (according to the address, which also specifies "to al-Bāṭiliyya, under the cross-street bridge (sābāṭ) of the house of Muʿizz al-Dawla"). In Arabic script. Of note, there are few details about what it is like to be a prisoner in Nāblus. The letter mainly consists of a complaint about a lack of letters and the sender's isolation and cut-off state. He may be particularly disconsolate about having to pray alone. He urges the family members to respond quickly with their news and the news of who is alive and who is dead and news of a certain Murhaf ('and spare me nothing'). Edited by Claude Cahen, “Une lettre d'un prisonnier musulman des Francs de Syrie,” in Etudes de civilisation medievale... melanges offerts a E. R. Labande (Poitiers, 1975), 83–87. Transcription and translation (into French) are available on the Arabic Papyrology Database: https://www.apd.gwi.uni-muenchen.de/apd/show2.jsp?papname=Cahen_Prisonnier&line=1. (Information in part from Goitein’s index card.) AA. ASE.