68 – Ibn ʿAmmār, Aḥmad ibn ʿAmmār ibn Shādhī al-Baṣrī *

The consummate vizier, Abū al-ʿAbbās Aḥmad ibn ʿAmmār ibn Shādhī al-Baṣrī, vizier of the caliph al-Muʿtaṣim.

He was grave, composed, imposing, chaste, truthful, and upright—though his grandfather had been a simple miller.

Al-Muʿtaṣim placed Aḥmad in charge of the dīwān al-ʿarḍ (the military registry). For several months he laid the ledgers before the caliph, until an eloquent letter arrived from the governor ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṭāhir. Al-Muʿtaṣim said, “Answer him in secret; let no one learn of it.”

Ibn ʿAmmār proved unable to compose the reply and needed a secretary. When the caliph discovered this, he dismissed him and retained Ibn al-Zayyāt—one of the foremost stylists—as his scribe.

Al-Ṣūlī recounts: al-Bāqaṭānī told us, my father told us, that Ibn ʿAmmār used to give away one hundred dinars in charity every single day. When people remarked on the extravagance, he replied, “It is from the surplus of my estates and from the provision Allah has allotted me.”

A dispatch came from the Mountain District announcing prosperity, abundant crops, and plentiful pasture. Al-Muʿtaṣim asked him, “What is kalāʾ?”

He did not know, so he asked Ibn al-Zayyāt, who explained, “It is the fresh grass.”

It was also said that Ibn ʿAmmār completed a full recitation of the Qurʾan every three nights. Later he performed the ḥajj and took up residence near the Sacred Precinct.

He died in Basra in 238 AH, in the latter part of his middle years.

69 – Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad ibn al-ʿAbbās ibn ʿUthmān ibn Shāfiʿ ** (Q, S)

The imam and hadith scholar, Abū Isḥāq al-Qurashī,