there for seven years, then he went to Egypt to visit Kāfūr in 340 AH. Later, the people of Damascus rose up against him, abused him, and drew up formal complaints; he was deposed and remained in Egypt until the closing days of Ibn al-Khaṣīb and his son. Ibn Walīd then sought the judgeship, offering three thousand dinars, which he sent through Fannak the chamberlain, but the official witnesses praised Abū Ṭāhir and took his side. Kāfūr therefore appointed him again, obtained the deed of investiture for him from the judge Ibn Umm Shaybān, and he assumed the bench with general approval.

He produced abridgements of the Qurʾānic exegesis of al-Jubbāʾī and that of al-Balkhī. Afterwards Ibn Walīd was appointed judge of Damascus.

Abū Ṭāhir’s father had taken great care with his education, arranging for him to listen to hadith; thus he met the senior scholars and heard from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad and Ibrāhīm al-Harbī, though he transmitted nothing from them because of his youth.

Roughly two hundred fascicles were taken from him by way of dictation and public reading. He also transmitted the book “Ṭabaqāt al-Shuʿarāʾ” by Muḥammad ibn Sallām (1), which he had received from Abū Khalīfa, who in turn had taken it from the author.

His affairs remained steady until, in 366 AH, he was struck by an illness that paralysed one side of his body. At that point al-ʿAzīz, the ruler of Egypt, entrusted the judiciary to ʿAlī ibn al-Nuʿmān. Abū Ṭāhir’s own tenure had lasted sixteen years and ten months. He stayed bedridden, while the hadith scholars continued to flock to him.

He died on the last day of 367 AH. It is also said that he died at the end of Dhu al-Qaʿda that year, and another report states that he had asked to be relieved of office shortly before his death.

Among the verses he composed about his son are: