, al-Qarqasānī, Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar al-Wāqidī, ʿUmar ibn Saʿīd al-Dimashqī, Abū Mushir, ʿAffān, and many others. Indeed, he would even take ḥadīths from Ibn al-Madīnī, Abū Khaythamah, Aḥmad ibn Ibrāhīm al-Dawraqī, and Ismāʿīl ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Sukkari.
He was one of the great reservoirs of knowledge, and anyone who studies Al-Ṭabaqāt cannot but bow to his learning.
Among those who narrated from him were Abū Bakr ibn Abī al-Dunyā, al-Ḥārith ibn Abī Usāmah, al-Ḥusayn ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Fahm, Aḥmad ibn Yaḥyā al-Balādhurī, and Abū al-Qāsim al-Baghawī.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: “I asked my father about Ibn Saʿd, and he replied, ‘Reliable. I saw him come to al-Qawārīrī, ask him about some ḥadīths, and al-Qawārīrī narrated them to him.’” (1)
Ibn Saʿd himself, in his section on those who fought at Badr, said: “Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn told us, Hishām ibn Yūsuf related to us, from Maʿmar, from Ayyūb, from Muḥammad, who said:
‘When Abū Ṭālib was on his deathbed, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ came to him. Abū Ṭālib said, “My nephew, when I die, go to your maternal uncles among the Banū al-Najjār, for they are the most protective of what is in their houses.”’” (2)
Sulaymān ibn Isḥāq ibn Khalīl said: I heard Ibrāhīm al-Harbī say:
“Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal used to send Ḥanbal every Friday to Ibn Saʿd to collect two booklets of al-Wāqidī’s ḥadīths so that he could examine them.”
Ibrāhīm added, “Had he gone and heard them directly, it would have been better for him.” (3)
Al-Ḥusayn ibn Fahm said: “I was with Muṣʿab al-Zubayrī when Ibn Maʿīn passed by us—”