and there he died at dawn on the seventeenth of Dhu al-Ḥijjah, leaving behind money and household furnishings that passed to the bayt al-māl (public treasury). Allah—glorified and exalted—is the One who knows best.
All praise is for Allah. I ask His forgiveness. There is no power and no strength except through Allah. Allah is sufficient for us, and He is the best Guardian (1).
I say: This is the last event recorded by our teacher, the ḥāfiẓ ʿAlam al-Dīn al-Barzālī, in the supplement he composed to the Chronicle of Shaykh Shihāb al-Dīn Abū Shāma al-Maqdisī (2). Al-Barzālī himself passed away in the following year, in Muḥarram, at the stopping-place of Khalīṣ (3).
I have appended to his chronicle up to our own time, and I completed the material I selected from it on Wednesday, the twentieth of Jumādā al-Ākhira in the year 751 AH—may Allah grant it a good conclusion, amen (4).
Here ends what I have written from the creation of Adam up to our present day.
All praise belongs to Allah, Lord of the worlds, and may Allah bless our master Muḥammad, his family, his Companions, and those who follow them with excellence until the Day of Judgment (5).
Then came the year 739 AH (6). It opened while the sultan of Islam and the Muslims over Egypt and its dependencies, Syria and its dependencies, and the two holy sanctuaries was al-Malik al-Nāṣir Muḥammad, son of al-Malik al-Manṣūr Qalāwūn; in Egypt he had neither deputy nor vizier.
The judges of Egypt were as follows: as for the Shāfiʿī school, the Chief Judge was ʿIzz al-Dīn, son of Chief Judge Badr (7) al-Dīn Muḥammad ibn
(1) Not present in the Ṭ recension.
(2) He is Abd al-Rahman ibn Ismail ibn Ibrahim al-Maqdisi, who died in 665 AH. His work is al-Zhayl (the Supplement) to al-Rawdatayn fi akhbar al-dawlatayn al-Nuriya wa al-Salahiyya (The Two Gardens on the Histories of the Nuri and Salahi Dynasties). As for al-Barzali’s history, it is al-Muqtafi li-Tarikh Abi Shama (The Continuation of Abu Shama’s History), which survives only in manuscript; I possess a microfilmed copy up to 720 AH (Bashar).
(3) Not present in the Ṭ recension.
(4) It is well known that the material al-Hafiz Ibn Kathir includes in al-Bidaya wa al-Nihaya from 665 AH onwards is an abridgement of al-Barzali’s al-Muqtafi li-Tarikh Abi Shama, as indicated here and confirmed by comparing the two works. He then added, after that date (namely 751 AH), a continuation of the work up to what is reported as his death (Bashar).
(5) In manuscript B: “All praise and thanks are due to Allah. Written by Ismail ibn Kathir ibn Daw’ al-Qurashi al-Shafi‘i—may Allah forgive him; Amen—and by him for his own sake, the poorest of Allah’s servants and in greatest need of His mercy, the devoted adherent and servant of Ahl al-Sunnah, Muhammad ibn Sultan ibn Sa‘id al-Ba‘li al-Hanbali—may Allah forgive him by His grace and generosity.”
In Ṭ: addition: “And how excellent is al-Hariri’s verse:
If you find a flaw, then mend the breach…
Glorified is He in whom no flaw exists and exalted is He.”
(6) Here both manuscripts (A and B) end; for the remaining section we have relied in our edition on the sources cited by Ibn Kathir or citing him, as well as on biographical dictionaries and obituaries.
(7) In Ṭ: “Sadr al-Din.”