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The Ta'rīkh al-islām of adh-Dhahabī

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

Extract

In Arabic literature there is hardly any separation between works on political history and historical biography. This is due to the two sources from which historical traditions are derived: the sīra-literature dealing with the life of the prophet Muḥammad and the rather legendary traditions on the tribal warfare of the jāhiliyya known as ayyām al-'arab. It was on this double basis that Arabic historiography had gradually been built up. On the one hand, parallel to the sīra-literature, there developed the so-called ṭabaqāt-literature containing biographies first on the companions of Muḥammad ('ilm ar-rijāl), then on all sorts of illustrious men arranged into classes (ṭabaqāt) according to the year of their death. The Kitāb aṭ-ṭabaqāt al-kabīr of Ibn Sa'd az-Zuhrī (died in 230/845) was the first standard work of this kind of literature, which flourished especially in the post-classical period of Arabic literature in the increasing quantity of ṭabaqāt-works on rulers, theologians, jurisconsults, and poets.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1932

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References

page 815 note 1 A good survey of the ayyām al-'arab is given by al-Athīr, Ibn in his Kāmil, vol. i, pp. 367517Google Scholar, and by an-Nuwayrī in his Nihāyat al-arab fī funūn al-adab, fann V, qism IV, kitāb V.

page 817 note 1 See the remark of Nicholson, R. A. in his A Literary History of the Arabs, London, 1907, p. 454Google Scholar.

page 817 note 2 See my paper, “The Kitāb al-muntaẓam of Ibn al-Jauzī,” in the JRAS., 1932, pp. 49–76.

page 818 note 1 See his Histoire de l'Afrique el de l'Espagne par 'Adhārī, Ibn, Leiden, 18491851, p. 19Google Scholar.

page 819 note 1 Sources for the biography of adh-Dhahabī:—(1) Oriental works: as-Suyūṫī, , Ṭabaqāt al-ḥuffáẓ, ed. Wüstenfeld, F., xxi, 9Google Scholar; al-Kutubī, , Fawāt al-Wafayāt, Būlāq, 1282, vol. ii, pp. 183–4Google Scholar; as-Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt ash-Shāfi'iyya al-kubrā, Cairo, 1324, vol. v, pp. 216–26Google Scholar; al-Ḥanafī, Muḥammad ibn Āyās, Badā'i' az-zuhūr fī waqā'i' ad-duhūr, Būlāq, 1311, vol. i, p. 199Google Scholar; al-Wardī, 'Umar ibn, Ta'rīkh, Cairo, 1285, vol. ii, p. 348Google Scholar; Abul-Fidā, , Al-mukhtaṣar fī ta'rīk al- ashar, Istanbul, 1286, vol. iv, p. 155Google Scholar; al-Ālūsī, Ibn, Jalā, al-'aynayn fī muḥākamat al-Aḥmadayn, Būlāq, 1298, p. 21Google Scholar; ash-Shāfi'ī, Näṣiraddīn, Radd al-wāfir, Cairo, 1329, p. 19Google Scholar; al-Isnawī, Ṭabaqāt al-fuqahā, Br. M. Suppl., No. 643, fol. 72; Ibn Qāḍī Shuhba, Ṭabaqāt ash-Shāfi'iyya, Br. M. Suppl., No. 644, fol. 247–47b; al-Yāfi'ī, Mir' āt al-janān, Br. M. Suppl., No. 473, fol. 399b; al-'Asqalānī, Ibn Ḥajar, Ad-durar al-kāna, Br. M. Suppl., No. 614, vol. ii, fol. 54–54bGoogle Scholar; al-Hindī, Muḥammad ibn al-Jamandā ibn 'Īsā ibn Dā'ud al-Afghān, Muntahhab as-Sulūk, Bankipore Cat., vol. xv, No. 973, fol. 38bGoogle Scholar; 'Azam, Ibn, Dustūr al-i'lām, Bankipore Cat., vol. xii, No. 656, fol. 50bGoogle Scholar; al-'Akarī, 'Abdalḥayy ibn Aḥmad, Shadhrāt adh-dhahab fī alkhbār man dhahab, Cairo Cat., vol. v, p. 72, vol. iii, fol. 791–5Google Scholar. (2) European works: Wüstenfeld, Geschichtsschreiber, No. 410; Brockelmann, , Gesch. ar. Lit., vol. ii, p. 46Google Scholar; Cl. Huart, , Arabic Literature, London, 1903, pp. 341–2Google Scholar; Boygues, Pons, Ensayo bio-bibliografico, Madrid, 1898, p. 416Google Scholar; Cheneb, Moh. Ben, in Enc. of Islām, vol. i, p. 954Google Scholar.

page 819 note 2 See Moh. Ben Cheneb, loc. cit.

page 819 note 3 According to al-Kutubī, loc. cit., in Rabī 'al-awwal.

page 819 note 4 See as-Suyūṭī and as-Subkī, loc. cit.

page 820 note 1 See as-Subkī, loc. cit.

page 820 note 2 See Ibn Qāḍī Shuhba, Ṭabaqāt ash-Shāfi'iyya, loc. cit.

page 820 note 3 A MS. of it is in Cairo, see Cat., vol. i, 2nd ed., p. 252.

page 821 note 1 See as-Suyūṭī and as-Subkī, loc, cit.

page 821 note 2 See Muḥammad ibn Āyās, loc. cit.

page 821 note 3 See loc. cit.

page 821 note 4 Thus by as-Subkī, loc. cit., and by Ibn Qāḍī Shuhba, loc. cit.

page 821 note 5 See in the Ad-durar al-kāmina of Ibn Ḥajar al-'Asqalānī, loc. cit.

page 821 note 6 See as-Suyūṭi, Ṭabaqát al-ḥuffāẓ, loc. cit.

page 821 note 7 Ibid.

page 821 note 8 See his Ṭa'rīkh, loc. cit.

page 821 note 9 See his Ṭa'rīkh, loc. cit.

page 822 note 1 See Brockelmann, op. oit., pp. 47–8, and Spiesz, O., Beiträge zur arabischen Literaturgeschichte, Abhandl. f. d. Kunde des Mgl., Leipzig, 1932, pp. 110–13Google Scholar.

page 822 note 2 Excerpts from the Tadhhīb were edited by Fischer, A. in his Biographien von Gewāhrsmānnern des Ibn Isḥāq, hauptsächlich aus aḏ-Ḏahabī, Leiden, 1890Google Scholar.

page 823 note 1 The following parts of the Ta'rīkh al-islām have hitherto been edited: (1) The biography of Ibn Rushd by Renan, J. B., Averroës et l'Averrïsme, Appendice iv, 2e édition, Paris, 1861Google Scholar. (2) The biography of Abul-'Alä al-Ma'arrī, which is more copious than that of Ibn Khallikān and also following different sources, has been edited from the MS. of the British Museum, No. 1637 as an appendix to The Letters of Abul-'Alā of Ma'arrat an-Nu'mān, by Margoliouth, D. S. in the Anecdota Oxoniniensa, Semitic Series, Oxford, 1898, pp. 129–37Google Scholar. (3) The biography of 'Umära al-Yamanï is edited from the MS. of the British Museum, No. 1639, by Dérenbourg, H. in his 'Oumāra du Yemen, sa vie et son œuvre, tome ii, Paris, 1902, pp. 491–5Google Scholar. (4) Short excerpts are printed in the notes to the Dhayl ta'rīlkh Dimashq of Ibn al-Qalānisī, ed. Amedroz, H. F., Beyruth, 1908Google Scholar.

page 824 note 1 According to Ḥājī Khalīfa, No. 2220.

page 824 note 2 According to al-Kutubī, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 183.

page 824 note 3 See Ḥājī Khalīfa, ibid.

page 824 note 4 Ibid.

page 824 note 5 al-Kutubī, loc. cit.

page 824 note 6 See his Ṭabaqāt ash-Shāfi'iyya al-kubrā, vol. v, p. 217.

page 824 note 7 See Brockelmann, vol. ii, p. 46–7; Enc. of Isl., sub adh-Dhahabī; Sarkīs, E., Majmū'a al-maṭbū'āt al-'arabiyya, Cairo, 1928Google Scholar; Hand-List, Cambridge, No. 182; Suppl. Cat. of the British Museum, No. 468; List, Br. Mus., since 1894, Or. 48 and Or. 5578; the handwritten List of Oriental MSS. of the British Museum from 1911-; Horovitz, J., Aus den Bibliothehen von Kairo, Damaskus and Konstantinopel, Berlin, 1907 (Mitteil. d. Sem. f. orient. Spr.), pp. 913Google Scholar; O. Spiesz, op. cit., pp. 70–2.

page 825 note 1 And not 1880 as given by Brockelmann, loc. cit., and Horovitz, loc. cit.

page 825 note 2 And not 1573, as given by Brockelmann, loc. cit.

page 826 note 1 According to Brockelmann and Horovitz, loc. cit., only till a.h. 370.

page 827 note 1 See Horovitz, op. cit., p. 11.

page 827 note 2 See Spiesz, op. cit., p. 70.

page 828 note 1 See Ḥājī Khalīfa, No. 2220.

page 828 note 2 Ibid.

page 828 note 3 See Brockelmann, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 65; Banlcipore Cat., vol. v, No. 442; Horovitz, op. cit., p. 12.

page 828 note 4 See Brockelmann, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 67; Bankipore Cat., vol. v, part No. 318.

page 828 note 5 See Ḥājī Khalīfa, Nos. 951 and 2098; Spiesz, op. cit., p. Ammerkung 1.

page 828 note 6 Spiesz, op. cit., p. 71, also quotes Köprülüzāde, No. 1189, a continuation of the Ta'rīkh al-islām by as-Sākhawī (died in 902/1497), but, as its title shows (Wajīz al-kalām fī dhayl Duwal al-islām), it is a continuation of the Duwal al-islām of adh-Dhahabī. (See below.)

page 829 note 1 For the compendiums of the Ta'rīkh al-islām see my paper in the Islamica, Leipzig, 1932, pp. 334–53Google Scholar. O. Spiesz (op. cit., p. 73) also mentions a Muntahhab at-ta'rīkh al-kabīr, a MS. of which is in Welī, No. 2449; it treats in three classes: (1) of the companions of Muḥammad and of the tābi'un; (2) of the fuqahā and 'ulamā; (3) of the ḥukamā and aṭibbā, including also the Greek philosophers.

page 829 note 2 See p. 550.

page 830 note 1 Brockelmaim (loc. cit.) mentions also a Turkish translation of the Ta'rīkh al-islām, in Berlin (Türkischer Katalog, No. 192). This is, however, the Turkish translation of another work on general history, the Al-bidāya wan-nihāya of Ibn Kathīr ad-Dimashqi (died in 774/1372).

page 831 note 1 In several manuscript volumes all the classes of the general narrative are grouped together and are followed by all the classes of the biographies.

page 832 note 1 See my paper in the JRAS. 1932, pp. 58–62.

page 832 note 2 The MSS. consulted are those of the British Museum and the Bodleian Library.

page 833 note 3 Ibn al-Athīr, vol. viii, p. 85, gives his name as Sarīḥ.

page 839 note 1 See the more copious record of an-Nasawī, ed. Houdas, pp. 38–42.

page 845 note 1 See the MS. of the Bodleian Library (Ury), No. 649, fol. 179b–83

page 839 note 2 See vol. xii, p. 112.

page 849 note 1 He also remembers in the general narrative of a.h. 597 that it was in that year that the Kitāb al-munlaẓam ended (see the MS. of the Bodleian library (Ury), No. 649, fol. 1486,1. 7).

page 849 note 2 See ibid., fol. 1486, 11. 9–10.

page 840 note 1 The works of reference consulted are the Ṭabaqāt al-ḥuffāẓ of the same adh-Dhahabī in the well-known recension of as-Suyūṭī, the works of Ibn Khallikān, as-Sam'ānī and Ḥājī Khalīfa.