Hostname: page-component-cb9f654ff-65tv2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-08-08T19:33:40.089Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

An Arabic legal document from the Umayyadperiod*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2009

Geoffrey Khan
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The number of Arabic papyri from the first two Islamiccenturies that have been preserved is relativelysmall. Papyri from the third century A.H. are farmore numerous and constitute the bulk of mostcollections. In this paper I publish an Arabic legaldocument from A.H. 77 (A.D. 707), which is in theMichaelides collection of papyri at CambridgeUniversity Library. It is one of the earliest extantArabic legal papyri. The document is a quittance(barā’a) drawn up by a certainSa‘īd ibn Qays al-Dallālī to certify that Jamīla,the freedwoman of ’Umm Hunayda, is cleared ofobligation to him after the payment of a sum ofseven dīnārs. This sum was delivered as payment fora portion of a house.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 4 , Issue 3 , November 1994 , pp. 357 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1994

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

*

Abbreviations: ABPH = W. Diem,Arabische Briefe auf Papyrus und Papieraus der Heidelberger Papyrus-Sammlung(Wiesbaden, 1991); ALAD = G. Khan, ArabicLegal and Administrative Documents in theCambridge Genizah Collections (Cambridge,1993); APEL = A. Grohmann, Arabic Papyriin the Egyptian Library, 6 vols. (Cairo,1934–74); APK = G. Khan, Arabic Papyri ofthe 7th to 10th Centuries (Oxford, 1993);BAU = Aegyptische Urkunden aus den koeniglichenMuseen zu Berlin, herausgegeben von derGeneralverwaltung, ArabischeUrkunden [ed. L.Abel] (Berlin,1896–1900); CP A = A. Grohmann and R. G. Khoury,Chrestomathie de papyrologie arabe,préparée par Adolf Grohmann, retravailleé etélargie par Raif Georges Khoury(Leiden-New York-Köln) 1993; DJD II = P. Benoit,J. T. Milik and R. De Vaux, Discoveries inthe Judaean Desert II; Les Grottes deMurabba‘ât (Oxford, 1961); EN III = C. J.Kraemer Jr., Excavations atNessana. Vol. III. Non-literaryTexts (Princeton, 1958); JESHO =Journal ofthe Economic and Social History oftheOrient; Michaelides P. = Papyri formerlyin the collection of G. Michaelides, now in thepossession of Cambridge University Library; P.Mich. = P. J. Sijpesteijn, The AphroditePapyri in the University of Michigan PapyrusCollection (P. Mich. XIII) (Zutphen,1977); SAPKC = G. Khan, Arabic Papyri.Selected Material from the KhaliliCollection (Oxford, 1992); SGEA = S.Hopkins, Studies in the Grammar of EarlyArabic, Based upon Papyri Datable to before 300A.H./912 A.D. (Oxford, 1984).

References

1 I am grateful to the syndics of Cambridge University Library for granting me permission to publish this manuscript.

2 In later documents (from the third century A.H. onwards) the term used for a portion of a house is usually ḥiṣṣa or sahm (literally “share”); cf. al-Ṭaḥāwī, , Kitāb al-ŝurūt al-kabīr, ed. Wakin, in The Function of Documents in Islamic Law (Albany, 1972), text pp. 52–9Google Scholar, Ibn al-Sayrafī, in al-Nuwayrī, , Nihāyat al-’arab fī funūn al-’adab ix (Cairo, 1931), p. 24.Google Scholar The word qiṭ‘a corresponds more closely to the terms used in Byzantine Greek μ⋯ργς and Jewish Aramaic (ḥwlq’) formularies; cf. Mich, P.. pp. 662:18, 665:9Google Scholar, Assaf, S., The Book of Shetaroth of R. Hai Gaon (Jerusalem, 1930), pp. 37–8.Google Scholar Some later Arabic formularies, however, still retain the term qit‘a, e.g. al-Fatāwā al-‘Ālamgīriyya, ed. Calcutta, (1835), vi, p. 427.Google Scholar

3 I.e. the seven dīnārs.

4 June—July A.D. 707.

5 Al-Sam‘ānī, , Kitāb al-’ansāb (Hyderabad, 1962ff), xiii, p. 483Google Scholar; al-Kalbī, , Jamharat al-nasab i, p. 278, ii, p. 589. The vocalization Yaḥṣub is found in some sources.Google Scholar

6 Al-Sam‘ānī, vii, p. 169, xi, pp. 186–90Google Scholar; al-Kalbī, i, p. 277, ii, pp. 236, 518.Google Scholar

7 Al-Kalbī, , jamharat al-nasab, i, p. 176, ii, p. 375Google Scholar; Encyclopaedia of Islam, second edition, article “Lakhm”

8 Al-Maqrīzī, , Kitāb al-mawā‘ịz wa-l-i’tibār (Būlāq, 1853), i, pp. 297–8Google Scholar; al-Qalqaŝandī, , Kitāb ṣubh al-’a‘ŝā (Cairo, 1903–18), pp. 331–2.Google Scholar

9 SAPKC 9 (A.H. 104), David-Weill, JESHO, XXI, no. 24 (A.H. 123), CPA no. 49 (185). [For abbreviations see the beginning of the article.]Google Scholar

10 The reading of David-Weill must be corrected to faqad bari'a minhā…’ilā.

11 These documents are in the possession of a private collector.

12 Torrey, C. C., “An Arabic papyrus dated 205 A.H.”, JAOS, LVI (1956), pp. 288–92.Google Scholar

13 Cited by al-Ṭaḥawī, , Kitāb al-ŝurūṭ al-kabu, ed. Wakin, , text, p. 15.Google Scholar

14 Ed. Wakin, , text, pp. 3, 15–6.Google Scholar

15 Frantz-Murphy, G., “ A comparison of Arabic and earlier Egyptian contract formularies, Part IV: Quittance formulas”, JNES, XLVII (1988), pp. 269–271Google Scholar, ALAD, p. 24.Google Scholar

16 ALAD, p. 203Google Scholar; al-Ṭaḥāwī, , Kitāb al-šurūṭ al-kabīr ed. Schacht, J., Sitzungsberichte der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 4. Abhandlung (Heidelberg, 1927), p. 31:13.Google Scholar One of the earliest examples from extant documents is found in Michaelides P. B 386 (A.H. 260). See also below. Some documents from the Ottoman period include among the closing formulae the phrase qābiluhu ‘alā nafsihi fulān: “so-and-so accepts it as binding” (see Ebied, R. Y. and Young, M. J. L., Some Arabic Legal Documents of the Ottoman Period [Leiden, 1976], pp. 13, 14).Google Scholar

17 According to the reading of Yadin, , Israel Oriental Journal, XII, p. 254.Google Scholar

18 Goldstein, J. A., “The Syriac bill of sale from Dura-Europos”, Journal of Near Eastern Studies, XXV (1966), pp. 3, 7.Google Scholar

19 Cited by Greenfield, J. in Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam, XV (1992), pp. 11–12, 17.Google Scholar

20 See G. Khan, “T h e pre-Islamic background of Muslim legal formularies”, forthcoming in Aram.

21 The Greek version of this bilingual document, by contrast, does have an autograph witness clause. This is clear evidence that the Arabic legal formularies had a considerable independence from the Greek formulary traditions at this early period; cf. G. Khan, “ T h e pre-Islamic background of Muslim legal formularies”.

22 Al-Ṭaḥawī, , Kitāb al-šurūt al-kabīr, in Wakin, J., The Function of Documents in Islamic Law (Albany, 1972), text, p. 7.Google Scholar

23 Ed. Calcutta, (1835) vi, p. 422.Google Scholar

24 This is n ow in the possession of a private collector in London.

25 E.g. APEL 89 (A.H. 209), APK 187 ( A.H. 210), APEL 126 (A.H. 225), APEL 98 (A.H. 236), APEL 56 (A.H. 239), APEL 114 (A.H. 241), APEL 127 ( A.H. 247), APEL 93 (A.H. 251), Michaelides P.B 601 (A.H. 262), APEL 39 (A.H. 264), Michaelides P.B 287 (A.H. 264), APEL 128 (A.H. 270), APEL 124 (A.H. 271), APEL 129 (A.H. 272), Michaelides P.B 1410 (A.H. 272), APEL 52 (A.H. 274), APEL 41 (A.H. 279), Michaelides P.B 134 (A.H. 280), Michaelides P.B 152 ( A.H. 283), APEL 100 ( A.H. 284), APEL 121 (A.H. 284), APEL 142 (A.H. 298), APEL 143 (A.H. 298).

26 See Meyer, P., Juristische Papyri: Erklärung von Urkunden zur Einführung in die juristische Papyruskunde (Berlin, 1920), pp. 108, 112–13.Google Scholar

27 ‘Iqrārāt are first referred to in the witness formulae of documents from Egypt at the beginning of the third century A.H.: Torrey, , JAOS, LVIGoogle Scholar (a.h. 205, šahida ‘alā ‘iqrā⟨r⟩ fulān, read so!), Michaelides P.B 599 (A.H. 225, šahida fulān ‘alā’ iqrār fulān). The first ’iqrār documents date from the middle of the third century, e.g. APEL 114 (A.H. 241).

28 Kitāb al-šurūṭ al-kabīr, ed. Wakin, , text, p. 7.Google Scholar

29 Some documents have: ‘inda šuhūd hāḏā al-kitāb, see ALAD, 203.Google Scholar

30 ALAD nos. 140–159.