Ishaq ibn Haniʾ said, “Abu ʿAbd Allah passed away without leaving anything except six small coins wrapped in a rag, worth no more than two daniqs (a very small silver coin).

Al-Marwadhi reported that Ahmad once remarked:
“I used to set out early to attend hadith, yet on some occasions my intention in doing so was not what it ought to have been.”

ʿAbd Allah said, “I heard my father relate:
“More than once I wanted to leave at dawn for hadith, but my mother would hold on to my garment and say, ‘Wait until the muʾadhdhin gives the adhan.’ I would sometimes still hurry off at first light to the circle of Abu Bakr ibn ʿAyyash.”

ʿAbbas al-Duri stated, “I heard Ahmad say, ‘The very first teacher I frequented when I began to seek knowledge was the judge Abu Yusuf.’ ”

ʿAbd Allah added, “My father had copied the books of Abu Yusuf and Muhammad [ibn al-Hasan] and knew them by heart. Muhanna once told me, ‘I would ask him about something and he would reply, “That is not in their books.” ’ I would then go back to those scholars, and they would say, ‘Your companion knows the books better than we do.’ ”

Al-Marwadhi narrated, “I heard Abu ʿAbd Allah say, ‘I did not travel to Syria until after my son Salih was born; I think he was six years old when I set out.’
“I asked, ‘I suppose you never travelled after that?’
“He said, ‘No.’
“I asked, ‘How long did you stay in Yemen?’
“He replied, ‘The whole journey there and back took ten months. We left Mecca in Safar and returned in time for the pilgrimage season.’
“I asked, ‘Did you write hadith from Hisham ibn Yusuf?’
“He answered, ‘No, he died before we reached him.’ ”

ʿAbd Allah ibn Ahmad reported: “My father told me, ‘Yazid ibn Muslim al-Hamdani—he was 135 years old—narrated to us: “Muhammad ibn Yusuf, the brother of al-Hajjaj, arrived when I was five years old, in the year 73 AH.” ’ ”

Al-Marwadhi also said that Abu ʿAbd Allah recounted, “We came upon an elderly shaykh outside Sanaʿa who—”