Cairo Geniza

Coordinates: 30°00′21″N 31°13′52″E / 30.0057944°N 31.2310222°E / 30.0057944; 31.2310222

The Cairo Genizah, alternatively spelled Geniza, is a collection of some 300,000Jewish manuscript fragments that were found in the genizah or storeroom of the Ben Ezra Synagogue in Fustat or Old Cairo, Egypt. These manuscripts outline a 1,000-year continuum (870 CE to 19th century) of Jewish Middle-Eastern and North African history and comprise the largest and most diverse collection of medieval manuscripts in the world. The Genizah texts are written in various languages, especially Hebrew, Arabic and Aramaic, mainly on vellum and paper, but also on papyrus and cloth. In addition to containing Jewish religious texts such as Biblical, Talmudic and later Rabbinic works (some in the original hands of the authors), the Genizah gives a detailed picture of the economic and cultural life of the North African and Eastern Mediterranean regions, especially during the 10th to 13th centuries. It is now dispersed among a number of libraries, including the libraries of Cambridge University and the University of Manchester. Some additional fragments were found in the Basatin cemetery east of Old Cairo, and the collection includes a number of old documents bought in Cairo in the latter nineteenth century.

Cairo

Cairo (/ˈkaɪroʊ/ KYE-roh; Arabic: القاهرة‎, al-Qāhirah) is the capital and largest city of Egypt. Greater Cairo is the largest metropolitan area in the Middle East and the Arab world, and 15th-largest in the world, and is associated with ancient Egypt, as the famous Giza pyramid complex and the ancient city of Memphis are located in its geographical area. Located near the Nile Delta, modern Cairo was founded in 969 CE by Jawhar al-Siqilli ("the Sicilian") of the Fatimid dynasty, but the land composing the present-day city was the site of ancient national capitals whose remnants remain visible in parts of Old Cairo. Cairo has long been a center of the region's political and cultural life, and is nicknamed "the city of a thousand minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture.

Egyptians today often refer to Cairo as Maṣr ([mɑsˤɾ], مصر), the Egyptian Arabic pronunciation of the name for Egypt itself, emphasizing the city's continued role in Egyptian influence. Its official name is القاهرة al-Qāhirah , means literally: "the Defeater", in reference to the fact that the planet Mars ("Al Najm Al Qahir") was rising at the time when the city was founded as well as, "the Vanquisher"; "the Conqueror"; Egyptian Arabic pronunciation: [elqɑ(ː)ˈheɾɑ], "the Defeater" or, " "the Victorious" (al-Qahira) in reference to the much awaited Caliph al-Mu'izz li Din Allah who arrived from the old Fatimid Ifriqiyan capital of Mahdia in 973 to the city. The Egyptian name for Cairo is said to be: Khere-Ohe, meaning: "The Place of Combat", supposedly, in reference to a battle which took place between the Gods Seth and Horus. Sometimes the city is informally also referred to as كايرو Kayro [ˈkæjɾo]. It is also called Umm ad-Dunya, meaning "the mother of the world".

The Cairo

The Cairo apartment building, located at 1615 Q Street NW in Washington, D.C., is a landmark in the Dupont Circle neighborhood and the District of Columbia's tallest residential building. Designed by architect Thomas Franklin Schneider and completed in 1894 as the city's first "residential skyscraper", the 164-foot (50 m)-tall brick building spurred local regulations and federal legislation that continue to shape Washington's cityscape.

Today, the Cairo is a condominium building, home to renters and owners of apartments ranging in size from small studios to multi-level two- and three-bedroom units.

Appearance

The Egyptian theme of the building is stamped across its Moorish and Romanesque Revival features. Gargoyles perch high above the front entrance; some are winged griffins staring down from cornices, and others are more lighthearted. Along the first floor are elephant heads, which look left and right from the stone window sills of the front windows and which interlock trunks at the corners of the entrance arch. On the fourth floor are dragon and dwarf crosses. The carved stone façade hints at more exotic Middle Eastern origins.

Genizah

A genizah (or geniza; Hebrew: גניזה "storage"; plural: genizot or genizoth or genizahs) is a storage area in a Jewish synagogue or cemetery designated for the temporary storage of worn-out Hebrew-language books and papers on religious topics prior to proper cemetery burial.

Etymology

The word genizah comes from the Hebrew triconsonantal root g-n-z, which means “hiding”, and originally meant "to hide" or "to put away". Later, it became a noun for a place where one put things, and is perhaps best translated as "archive" or "repository".

Description

Genizot are temporary repositories designated for the storage of worn-out Hebrew-language books and papers on religious topics prior to proper cemetery burial, it being forbidden to throw away writings containing the name of God. As even personal letters and legal contracts may open with an invocation of God, the contents of genizot have not been limited to religious materials; in practice, they have also contained writings of a secular nature, with or without the customary opening invocation, as well as writings in other Jewish languages that use the Hebrew alphabet (Judeo-Arabic, Judeo-Persian, Judeo-Spanish, and Yiddish).