—the scholar Abū Saʿīd Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad al-Nawqānī, a follower of the Shāfiʿī school.
Nawqān—pronounced with a short “a” (fatḥa) on the first syllable—is a small town that serves as the principal settlement of Ṭūs.
He was born in 513 AH; others said 514 AH.
His father hastened to secure for him an ijāza (formal authorisation) from Muḥyī al-Sunna Abū Muḥammad al-Baghawī, together with the latter’s chains of transmission.
He heard al-Bayhaqī’s “al-Arbaʿīn al-Ṣughrā” from ʿAbd al-Jabbār ibn Muḥammad al-Khawārī, and he heard the “Musnad al-Shāfiʿī” from his own father.
He studied law under Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā, a disciple of al-Ghazālī, until he mastered the school; he taught, issued fatwas, rose to eminence, and became a recognised authority.
Among those who transmitted from him were Abū Rashīd al-Ghazzāl and others.
He in turn granted ijāzas for his narrations to Imām Shams al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Abī ʿUmar and to al-Fakhr ʿAlī.
Abū al-Aʿlāʾ al-Faraḍī told us: “He fell ill in Nīshāpūr, was carried to Nawqān, and there he died in 600 AH.”
I add: we transmit the works of Muḥyī al-Sunna through Ibn Abī ʿUmar and al-Fakhr, by ijāza, on his authority from Muḥyī al-Sunna.
In that same year there also died: the erudite Asʿad ibn Maḥmūd al-ʿIjlī; Ismāʿīl ibn ʿAlī ibn Wakkās al-Qaṭṭān; Baqāʾ ibn ʿUmar ibn Ḥunnad al-Azajī; Abū al-Faraj Jābir ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Liḥya al-Ḥamawī; the ruler of Rūm, Rukn al-Dīn Sulaymān ibn Qilij Arslān the Seljuk; Shujāʿ ibn Maʿālī ibn Shadqīnī al-Gharrād; and the imām Abū Saʿd ibn