and al-Mubārak ibn ʿAlī al-Samadhī, and Abū Bakr ibn al-Ashqar.

Al-Farawī of Nishapur and Ibn al-Ḥuṣayn of Baghdad granted him authorisation (ijāzah). He then returned to Isfahan, wholly absorbed in study, though his circumstances shifted from one post to another.

Among those who narrated from him were Yūsuf ibn Khalīl, al-Khaṭīr Futuḥ ibn Nūḥ, al-ʿIzz ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn ʿUthmān al-Irbilī, al-Shihāb al-Qūṣī, and a number of others.

He likewise licensed our own teacher Aḥmad ibn Abī al-Khair to transmit his narrations.

Aluh is a Persian word meaning “eagle.” It is pronounced with a fatḥah on the first letter, a ḍammah on the second, and the hāʾ is quiescent.

He first attached himself to Ibn Hubayra, then moved to Damascus in 562 AH, entered government service, and composed state correspondence for King Nūr al-Dīn.

Gifted in Persian prose as well, he was dispatched by Nūr al-Dīn as envoy to the Caliph al-Mustanjid. In 567 AH he was appointed professor at the ʿImādiyya, after which he was placed in charge of overseeing the dīwān. When Nūr al-Dīn died he was neglected, so he headed to Mosul; there he fell ill, and afterwards he returned to Aleppo while Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn was besieging it in 570 AH. He praised Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn and joined his entourage; Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn employed him as a scribe and brought him close. Whenever the eminent Qāḍī al-Fāḍil had to withdraw to Egypt for pressing affairs, al-ʿImād would take his place in the chancellery.

He compiled Kharīdat al-Qaṣr wa Jarīdat al-ʿAṣr as a sequel (dhayl) to Zīnat al-Dahr by al-Ḥaẓīrī, which itself continues Dumyat al-Qaṣr wa ʿUṣrat Ahl al-ʿAṣr by al-Bākharzī, a sequel to Yatīmat al-Dahr by al-Thaʿālibī, which in turn follows al-Bāriʿ by Hārūn ibn ʿAlī al-Munajjim. The Kharīda encompasses the poets of his own age after the year 500 AH (1) and extends to ten volumes.