and that he was the grandson of Abū al-Bassām al-Ḥusaynī.

He heard from: Abū Bakr ibn al-Jadd; Abū al-Qāsim ibn Bashkuwāl; Abū ʿAbdallāh ibn al-Mujāhid; Abū ʿAbdallāh ibn Zarqūn; Abū al-Qāsim ibn Ḥubaysh; Abū Muḥammad ibn ʿUbayd Allāh; and Abū Muḥammad ibn Būnah.

In Tunis he transmitted Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim to a circle of students and also narrated from others, among them: Abū ʿAbdallāh ibn Bashkuwāl—who said, “I heard from him the book al-Ṣilah”—Abū ʿAbdallāh ibn al-Munāṣif, Abū al-Qāsim ibn Dahmān, Ṣāliḥ ibn ʿAbd al-Malik, Abū Isḥāq ibn Qurqūl, Abū al-ʿAbbās ibn Sīda, Abū ʿAbdallāh ibn ʿAmīrah, Abū Khālid ibn Rifāʿah, Abū al-Qāsim ibn Rushd the bookseller, Abū ʿAbdallāh al-Qubāʿī, and Abū Bakr ibn Mughawir.

It was said that he was thoroughly versed in hadith, painstaking in recording it, constantly present at its gatherings, gifted with elegant handwriting, and famous for precision. He possessed a broad command of philology, contributed to Arabic studies and other fields, and twice held the judgeship of Dāniyah. He was, however, removed because of a report (1) circulated about his conduct, so he set out on his travels. In Tlemcen he met Abū al-Ḥasan ibn Abī Ḥayyūn, from whom he received hadith, and he lectured in Tunis in 595 AH. Afterwards he performed the pilgrimage and, in the East, took notes at Isfahan and Nishapur from the pupils of al-Ḥaddād and al-Farāwī. Returning to Egypt, Sultan al-Malik al-ʿĀdil appointed him tutor to his son al-Kāmil, the heir apparent, housed him in Cairo, and thereby afforded him considerable worldly means. He regularly recited hadith aloud and taught.

Among his writings is a work entitled Iʿlām al-Naṣṣ al-Mubīn fī al-Mufāṣalah bayna Ahl Ṣiffīn (The Clear Demonstration Differentiating the Parties at Ṣiffīn).

I say: He also heard from Abū al-Qāsim al-Buṣayrī in Egypt, from Abū Jaʿfar al-Ṣaydalanī in Isfahan, and from Manṣūr al-Farāwī in Nishapur, where he received Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim with a higher isnād after having previously narrated it with a lower one. He taught and studied in Damascus as well, and in Wāsiṭ he heard from Abū al-Fatḥ al-Mandāʾī, from whom he received the Musnad of Aḥmad.