and Abū Bakr al-Khaṭīb, ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Saqallī, Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥumaydī, Aḥmad ibn ʿAlī ibn Ghazlūn, Abū ʿAlī ibn Sukkara al-Ṣadafī, Abū Bakr al-Fihri al-Ṭurṭūshī, his ascetic son Abū al-Qāsim ibn Sulaymān, Abū ʿAlī ibn Sahl al-Sabtī, Abū Baḥr Sufyān ibn al-ʿĀṣ, Muḥammad ibn Abī al-Khayr the judge, and many others.

Leading scholars studied law under him; his name spread far and wide, and he produced works of great value.

Qāḍī ʿIyāḍ (1) said: “While in Baghdad Abū al-Walīd hired himself out to guard a lane. When he returned to al-Andalus he used to hammer gold leaf for the spinners and draw up legal documents. His companions told me, ‘He would come out to us for our reading sessions with the mark of the hammer still on his hand,’ until his knowledge became widely known, the world (2) courted him, his standing grew, his stipends increased, and he died leaving ample wealth. The notables employed him to draft their letters, and he accepted their gifts. He served as judge in several parts of al-Andalus and composed al-Muntaqā fī al-Fiqh (3) and al-Maʿānī fī Sharḥ al-Muwaṭṭaʾ, which runs to twenty volumes and has no equal.

“He also authored a large comprehensive work, in which he reached the utmost perfection, entitled al-Istifāʾ; the five-volume al-Īmāʾ fī al-Fiqh; al-Sirāj fī al-Khilāf, which he did not finish; Mukhtaṣar al-Mukhtaṣar fī Masāʾil al-Mudawwana; a book on the variant transmissions of the Muwaṭṭaʾ; and another on al-Jarḥ (the discrediting of narrators).”