Jamāl al-Dīn Abū al-Ḥasan 'Alī ibn Yūsuf ibn Ibrāhīm ibn 'Abd al-Wahid al-Shaybānī (جمال الدين أبو الحسن علي بن يوسف بن ٳبراهي بن عبد الواحد الشيباني),
Life
'Alī al-Qifṭī, known as Ibn al-Qifṭī, was a native of
Qift, Upper
Egypt, the son of
al-Qadi al-Ashraf, Yūsuf al-Qifṭī (b.548/1153), and the grandson of Ibrāhīm ibn 'Abd al-Wāḥid,
al-Qāḍī al-Awḥad in the
Ayyubid court. Alī succeeded his father and grandfather into court administration but displayed scholarly inclinations. When the family left Qift in 1177, following the rising of a Fāṭimid
Pretender, his father, Yūsuf, took up official posts in Upper Egypt and 'Alī completed his early education in Cairo.
In 583/1187 Yūsuf al-Qifṭī was appointed deputy to Al-Qadi al-Fadil, chancellor and adviser to Saladin at Jerusalem, and patron and benefactor of Maimonides,[Yaqūt, Mu'jam al-Buldān, iv p.152] al-Qifti already held the honorific title "al-Qāḍī 'l-Akram al-Wazir" (most noble judge chief minister).
Throughout his life al-Qifṭī advocated scholarship and sought to pursue a literary career despite heavy constraints of high office. When Yaqūt had fled the Mongol invasion to Aleppo, he had received shelter from al-Qifti, who had assisted him in the compilation of his great geographical and biographical encyclopedia, known as Irshad. Yaqut al-Hamawi lists al-Qifṭī's pre-620 works (some were then incomplete). Al-Ṣafadī copied this list in his Wāfī fi 'l-Wafayāt and al-Kutubi's Fawāt al-Wafayat (1196) borrowed from it, but his copy is corrupted by many errors.
Works
Al-Qifṭī wrote mainly historical works and of 26 recorded titles just two survive. Most were destroyed during the Mongol invasion.
Extant
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Kitāb Ikhbār al-'Ulamā' bi Akhbār al-Ḥukamā (إخبار العلماء بأخبار الحكماء); abbrev. Ta'rikh al-Ḥukama (تاريخ الحكماء), 'The biographies and the books of the great philosophers'; a biographical dictionary of 414 physicians, philosophers and astronomers; the most important source of exact sciences and Hellenistic tradition in Islām and sole literary witness of many accounts by ancient Greek scholars.
[Julius Lippert, Ibn al-Qifṭīs Ta'rikh al-Ḥukamā, 1903]
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Inbā ar-Rawat 'alā 'Anbā an-Nuhat (3 vol.); synopsis (647/1249) by Muḥammad ibn 'Alī az-Zawanī.
[ed. Abu 'l-Fadl Ibrahim]
Lost
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Precious Pearls of the Account of the Master ( Ad-Dur ath-Thamin fi 'Akhbar al-Mutīmīn) (الدر الثمين في أخبار المتيمين)
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Report of the Muhammad Poets, ( Akhbar al-Muhammadin min al-Shuara), (posthumous); only fragments
[MS. Paris arab. 3335]
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History of Maḥmūd b. Sübüktigin (Sabuktakin) and His Sons'( wabanīhi, in al-Kubutī wabakīyat)
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History of the Seljuks, from the Beginning to the End of the Dynasty ( Baqiat Tārīkh as-Siljūqīa) (بقية تاريخ السلجوقية)
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Apostles of Poets; arranged by al-Aba' up to Muḥammad bin Sa'īd; posthumous work written by Ibn al-Haytham; History of the Poets; only poets named Muḥammad extant) (Kitāb al-Muhmidīn min ash-Shu'ra'i; ratibah 'alā al-Ābā' wa balagh bīhī Muḥammad bin Sa'id.) (كتاب المحمدين من الشعراء. رتبه على الآباء وبلغ به محمد بن سعيد) (wa Katab 'an al-Hasan bin al-Haythm) (وكتب عن الحسن بن الهيثم)
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History of the Mirdasid dynasty ( Akhbar al-Mirdas) (أخبار آلمرداس)
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The Biographies and Books of the Great Philosophers ( Akhbar al-Alama bi Akhyar al-Hukama)(إخبار العلماء بأخيار الحكماء)
[ al-Qifti ed. Shams-ad-Din, The Biographies and Books of the Great Philosophers]
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Account of the Grammarians ( Akhbar an-Nahwiyyin) (إخبار النحوين); survives only in abstract by al-Dhahabi.
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Account of the Writers and their Writings ( Akhbar al-Musanafin wa ma Sanafuh) (أخبار المصنفين وما صنفوه)
[ed. De Goeje &. Theodor Juynboll]
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History of the Yemen ( Tarikh al-Yemen) (تاريخ اليمن)
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Egypt; in six parts ('Akhbār Misr, fi sitta 'Ajza') (أخبار مصر، في ستة أجزاء):: including
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History of Cairo until the reign of Salah al-Din; identical to Comprehensive Tarikh al-Qifti contained in the epitome of Ibn Maktum (d. 749/1348)
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History of the Buyids
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History of the Maghreb
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Correction of Errors by al-Jawhari ( Islāh Khilal as-Sahāhi, lil-Jawhrī) (إصلاح خلل الصحاح، للجوهري،)
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Nahza al-Khater in Literature ( Nahazat al-Khāṭr >> fi-l-Adab) (نهزة الخاطر» في الأدب); History of Scholarship (the Shaykhs of al-Kindi), a supplement to the Ansab of al-Baladhuri, etc.
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Biographies of Ibn Rashiq, Abu Sa'id al-Sirafi
See also
Citations
Bibliography
External links
