I said: I have mentioned him for the sake of distinction, and because he is one of the leading authorities on tradition. God willing, I shall make clear whether any of his narrations have come down to us through Abū Sahl al-Qaṭṭān.

160 – Ismāʿīl ibn Qutaybah ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī *
The imām, exemplar, ḥadith scholar, and authoritative proof; Abū Yaʿqūb al-Sulamī of Nishapur.

He heard ḥadith from: Yaḥyā ibn Yaḥyā, Saʿd ibn Yazīd al-Farrāʾ, Yazīd ibn Ṣāliḥ al-Farrāʾ, Yaḥyā al-Ḥimmānī, Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Musnadī (1), Abū Bakr ibn Abī Shaybah, al-Qawārīrī, and others of their rank.

Those who narrated from him include: Ibrāhīm ibn Abī Ṭālib, Ibn Khuzaymah, Abū Ḥāmid ibn al-Sharqī, Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Sarrāj, Muḥammad ibn Ṣāliḥ ibn Hāniʾ, Aḥmad ibn Isḥāq al-Ṣibghī, and many others.

Al-Ḥākim said: “Ismāʿīl ibn Qutaybah was al-Bushtaniqānī; Bushtaniqān is a village half a parasang from the city.”

I heard Abū Bakr ibn Isḥāq say: “The first person whose gatherings I attended to hear ḥadith was Ismāʿīl ibn Qutaybah, and that was in the year 280 AH. When a man looked at him he was reminded of the early generations, owing to his comportment, his asceticism, and his piety.

We used to travel to Bushtaniqān; he would come out, sit on the gravel of the riverbank with the book in his hand, and narrate to us while weeping.

Whenever he said, ‘Yaḥyā ibn Yaḥyā narrated to us,’ he would add, ‘May Allah have mercy on Abū Zakariyyā.’”

Al-Ḥākim also said: “Ismāʿīl read all of the collections (al-Muṣannafāt) to Ibn Abī Shaybah, and they are…"