He was also the last person to transmit from al-Dīnawarī and al-Mutawakkilī.

In hadith he benefited enormously from close companionship with Ibn Nāṣir; in Qurʾān and belles-lettres he profited from Sibt al-Khayyāṭ and Ibn al-Jawāliqī; and in jurisprudence he learned from a number of scholars.

Those who narrated from him include: his son, the eminent scholar and statesman Muḥyī al-Dīn Yūsuf, preceptor of the Mustaʿṣimid court; his elder son ʿAlī the copyist; his grandson, the preacher Shams al-Dīn Yūsuf ibn Quzghulī al-Ḥanafī, author of “Mirror of the Era”; the ḥāfiẓ ʿAbd al-Ghanī; Shaykh Muwaffaq al-Dīn Ibn Qudāmah; Ibn al-Dubaythī; Ibn al-Najjār; Ibn Khalīl; al-Ḍiyāʾ; al-Yaldānī; al-Najīb al-Ḥarrānī; Ibn ʿAbd al-Dāʾim; and many others besides.

He stood unrivalled as a public exhorter: off the cuff he could fashion polished verse and exquisite prose, elaborating at length, astonishing, delighting, stirring, and captivating his listeners. None like him was seen before or after. He carried the banner of preaching and mastered all its branches. Endowed with a handsome appearance, a pleasant voice, the ability to move hearts, and exemplary conduct, he was an ocean in Qurʾānic exegesis, a leading authority on prophetic biography and history, celebrated for his mastery of hadith and its sciences, a jurist versed in points of consensus and disagreement, and well-grounded in medicine. Gifted with many talents, keen understanding, quick intelligence, prodigious memory and instant recall, he devoted himself to collecting and authoring books while maintaining dignity and refinement, an elegant bearing, graceful diction, pleasing manners, and praiseworthy qualities. Both elite and common folk held him in high esteem; I know of no one who produced as many works as he did.

His father died when he was three years old, so he was brought up by his aunt. His relatives were merchants in—