- Ibn Bashkuwāl – Khalaf ibn ʿAbd al-Malik al-Anṣārī
The Imām, erudite scholar, ḥadith master, discerning critic, meticulous author, and foremost traditionist of al-Andalus: Abū al-Qāsim Khalaf ibn ʿAbd al-Malik ibn Masʿūd ibn Mūsā ibn Bashkuwāl (1) ibn Yūsuf ibn Dāḥa (2) al-Anṣārī, the Andalusian, the Cordoban, author of “The History of al-Andalus” (3).
Birth: 494 AH.
He studied ḥadith with his father; with Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAttāb—he transmitted abundantly from him and this was his highest-ranked shaykh—with Abū Baḥr Sufyān ibn al-ʿĀṣ, Abū al-Walīd Ibn Rushd the Elder, Abū al-Walīd Ibn Ṭarīf, Abū al-Qāsim Ibn Baqī, Abū al-Ḥasan Shurayḥ ibn Muḥammad, the judge Abū Bakr Ibn al-ʿArabī, Abū Jaʿfar Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Buṭrūjī, and many others besides.
He also received written authorisations from Abū ʿAlī Ibn Sukkara al-Ṣadafī, Abū al-Qāsim Ibn Manẓūr, and a number of others.
Among the scholars of Baghdad who licensed him were Hibat Allāh ibn Aḥmad al-Shiblī—had permission been secured for him in his childhood while in Baghdad, he would have met al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī al-Busrī—and Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn ʿAlī al-Ṭuraythīthī,