of the religion, Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥasan ibn Muḥammad, son of Shaykh Abū al-Futūḥ Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAmrūk ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ḥasan ibn al-Qāsim ibn ʿAlqama ibn al-Naḍr ibn Muʿādh, a descendant of the jurist of Medina ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Qāsim ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Ṣiddīq Abū Bakr al-Qurashī al-Taymī al-Bakrī. His family settled first in Nishapur and later in Damascus, and he was given to Sufi practice.

Birth. He was born in Damascus in 574 AH.

Scholarly journeys and teachers. In Mecca he received hadith from his grandfather and from Abū Ḥafṣ al-Mayānashī. In Damascus he studied under Ḥanbal and Ibn Ṭabarzadh, and his daughter Shāmiyya also heard from the two of them. He then travelled on: in Herat he learned from Abū Rūḥ al-Harawī; in Nishapur from al-Muʾayyad al-Ṭūsī; in Isfahan from Abū al-Futūḥ Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Junayd, ʿAyn al-Shams al-Thaqafiyya, and others; in Merv from Abū al-Muẓaffar Ibn al-Samʿānī; and in Baghdad from Ibn al-Akhdar. He also took transmission in Mosul, Irbil, Aleppo, Egypt, and a number of other places.

Works. He compiled al-Arbaʿīn al-Baladiyya (The Forty Narrations on Various Cities), devoted himself to this field, wrote both elevated (ʿāli) and shorter (nāzil) chains, gathered and authored works, and began a History of Damascus as a supplement to Ibn ʿAsākir’s History, though the draft has been lost.

Students and transmitters. He narrated prolifically, and among those who learned from him were Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ, al-Birzālī, and other senior scholars. Those who transmitted on his authority include al-Dimyāṭī, al-Quṭb al-Qasṭallānī, Abū al-Maʿālī Ibn al-Bālisī, al-Badr Ibn al-Tūzī, al-Zayn Abū Bakr ibn Yūsuf al-Ḥarīrī, al-Tāj Aḥmad ibn Muzayz, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Ibn al-Zarrād, Muḥammad ibn al-Muḥibb, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Yaʿqūb al-Dimyāṭī, al-ʿAlāʾ al-Kindī, ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd ibn Sulaymān al-Maghribī, al-Jamāl ʿAlī Ibn al-Shāṭibī, and several others.