ibn Ibrāhīm, Mubārak ibn Faḍāla, Ḥammād ibn Salama, Bisṭām ibn Ḥurayth, al-Sarī ibn Yaḥyā, Jarīr ibn Ḥāzim, Sulaymān ibn al-Mughīra, Sallām ibn Abī Muṭīʿ, Muḥammad ibn Ṭalḥa ibn Muṣarrif, and a number of others.
Among those who transmitted from him were al-Bukhārī, Abū Dāwūd, al-Ḥumaydī—who died before him—ʿAmr ibn ʿAlī al-Fallās, Yaḥyā ibn Mūsā al-Khutt, Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā al-Dhuhlī, al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī al-Khallāl, Ḥajjāj ibn al-Shāʿir, Aḥmad ibn Saʿīd al-Dārimī, ʿAbbās al-Dūrī, ʿAbd ibn Ḥumayd, al-Dārimī, Abū Zurʿa, Muḥammad ibn al-Ḍurays, Abū Muslim al-Kajjī, Abū Khalīfa, and many others.
Of the earlier authorities, Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān and Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal also narrated from him.
Abū Ḥātim said: “Sulaymān ibn Ḥarb is an Imām among the Imāms. He never practiced tadlīs; he engaged in the critique of narrators and in jurisprudence. He is in no way inferior to ʿAffān—indeed, he may even have been older. Roughly 10,000 hadiths are known through him, and I never once saw a book in his hand. In my view he is dearer to me than Abū Salama al-Tabūdhakī with regard to Ḥammād ibn Salama—and in every other respect.”
“I attended Sulaymān ibn Ḥarb’s session in Baghdad, and the attendance was estimated at forty thousand men. His gathering was held beside the palace of al-Maʾmūn. A sort of pulpit was built for him; Sulaymān mounted it, and a group of commanders wearing black surrounded him. Al-Maʾmūn sat atop his palace; the gate was opened and a thin curtain was let down, behind which he sat, writing whatever Sulaymān dictated.
“The first question put to Sulaymān concerned the hadith of Ḥawshab ibn ʿAqīl. He must have said, ‘Ḥawshab ibn ʿAqīl narrated to us,’ more than ten times, yet they kept saying, ‘We cannot hear.’ One mustamlī (repeater) stood up, then a second and a third, but each time the crowd still called out, ‘We cannot hear.’ They finally said, ‘The only solution is for Hārūn the mustamlī to attend.’
“When he arrived he asked, ‘Whom did you mention?’ His voice boomed like thunder; they fell silent and all the other repeaters sat down, leaving Hārūn alone to relay the dictation.”