the broader sweep of Islamic history, and the history of Damascus in its various periods in general and in the author’s own time in particular. Long ago it was issued only once, by the Saʿādah Press, in an uncritical printing riddled with misreadings, distortions, omissions, and confusions—defects that greatly diminished its value and made reliance on it injurious to sound academic research. Yet most of the later reprints still took that edition as their basis, in spite of their claims to have consulted manuscripts.

For that reason a large group of scholars and academics looked forward to this major scholarly undertaking, carried out under the supervision of Shaykh ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Arnāʾūṭ—may Allah have mercy on him—and under the management and sponsorship of Mr. ʿAlī Mastū, proprietor of Dār Ibn Kathīr—may Allah preserve him.

On the first of the noble month of Shaʿbān, 1405 AH, a meeting was convened in the village of Basīmah in Wādī Baradā, attended by:

Shaykh ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Arnāʾūṭ, Dr. ʿAlī Abū Zayd, Dr. Muḥyī al-Dīn Dīb Mastū, Dr. Riyāḍ Murād, Mr. Maḥmūd al-Arnāʾūṭ, Dr. Nizār Abāẓah, Mr. Muḥammad Ḥassān ʿUbayd, Mr. Ḥasan Marwah, Mr. Akram al-Būshī, Mr. Ibrāhīm al-Zībāq, Dr. Maʾmūn al-Ṣāghirjī, Mr. Yāsīn al-Sawwās, Mr. Ṣalāḥ Muḥammad al-Khaymī—may Allah have mercy on him—Mr. Muḥammad Dīb Mastū, and Mr. ʿAlī Dīb Mastū.

• Work Plan and Methodology •

His Eminence Shaykh ʿAbd al-Qādir—may Allah have mercy on him—distributed the proposed work plan to the professors taking part in the edition. It read as follows:

Praise be to Allah, whose praise suffices, and peace be upon His chosen servants.

I testify that there is no god but Allah, He alone without partner, and I testify that Muhammad is His servant and messenger.

To proceed:

The first matter that must be clear to all the brothers participating in the verification of this book is that the present methodology was not devised to constrain the editor working on the section assigned to him. Its purpose, rather, is to bring together the efforts of the esteemed editors, so that, as far as possible, all their labors may converge in a single direction, both in form and in substance. This is to safeguard the success of the project from both the scholarly and the technical standpoints, for when the book appears—if Allah wills—it will be connected to the names of all those who took part in it, and its success will therefore be the success of everyone.

Accordingly, it was desired that this methodology encompass everything having to do with establishing the text and preparing it for publication, as set out below:

First: Concerning the manuscripts:

The copy held in the Aḥmadiyyah Library in Aleppo is to be adopted as the principal manuscript for the project, and it will be referred to by the agreed siglum