He possessed exceptionally high-level ijāzahs (authorizations). While he was still a child, the Musnid of Baghdad, the chamberlain Abū al-Ḥasan ibn al-ʿAllāf, granted him a licence, as did Abū al-Qāsim ibn Bayān; Abū ʿAlī ibn Nabḥān the scribe; Abū al-Fath Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥaddād; Ghānim al-Barjī; Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥaddād the Qur’an reciter; ʿAbd al-Ghaffār al-Shīrawī; the associate of the judge Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Ḥayrī; and many others besides.
His son al-Qāsim said: “Some portions of his own writings were transmitted from him by ijāzah during his lifetime, his name became renowned across the lands, and in his youth he studied jurisprudence under Jamāl al-Islām Abū al-Ḥasan al-Sulamī and others. He also benefited in grammar from the company of his maternal grandfather, the judge Abū al-Mufaḍḍal ʿĪsā ibn ʿAlī al-Qurashī (1). He gathered disputed legal questions from Abū Saʿd ibn Abī Ṣāliḥ al-Karmānī in Baghdad, regularly attended lessons and advanced studies at the Niẓāmiyyah there, and authored and compiled works of notable quality.”
He continued: “Among them is his History (2) in 800 fascicles.” I say: a fascicle consists of twenty
(1) In the printed biography reproduced in Ibn Asakir, p. 36, the name has been mistakenly changed to “Yahya.”
(2) The work’s full title is: “The History of the City of Damascus—may Allah protect her—its merits, and the naming of the eminent persons who settled in it or passed through its environs.” It ranks among the most extensive compositions ever written on the history of cities. Ibn Asakir patterned it after al-Khatib’s “History of Baghdad,” yet it surpasses that model in size, running to eighty volumes. He records the lives of notables, scholars, and famous figures who resided in Damascus or visited it from the time of the Companions up to his own day, and even includes some earlier personalities such as Sulayman and Shuayb. The biographical entries are arranged alphabetically, except that those named Ahmad are placed first, while still observing the fathers’ names.
The Arab Academy in Damascus undertook the publication of this monumental work—a most fitting choice. Volume 1 appeared in 1951, and Parts I and II of Volume 2 in 1954, edited by Dr. Salah al-Din al-Munajjid. Volume 10 was issued in 1963, edited by Shaykh Muhammad Ahmad Dahman; it opens with the entry for Busr b. Abi Arta and concludes with Thabit b. Aqram.
At the end of 1976 another volume was published, edited by Dr. Shukri Fayisal, containing the entries under the letter ayn followed by alif; it begins with Asim b. Bahdala and ends with Aidh b. Muhammad. This was followed in 1982 by a further volume edited by Dr. Shukri Fayisal together with Riyad Murad and Ruhiyya al-Nuhhas, starting with Ubada b. Awfa and ending with Abd Allah b. …