al-āIsāmī

ʿAbd al-Malik ibn al-Husain al-ʿIsāmī ( Arabic عبد الملك بن الحسين العصامي, DMG ʿAbd al-Malik ibn al-Ḥusain al-ʿIṣāmī born. 1639 in Mecca , d. November 17, 1699 ibid) was a Muslim historian , scholar and poet of Shafiite teaching who wrote an Arabic world chronicle that focuses on the city of Mecca.

Life

Al-ʿIsāmī came from a well-known Meccan Qādī and scholarly family and was the grandson of the Shafiite scholar ʿIsām ad-Dīn ibn ʿAbd al-Malik Jamāl ad-Dīn (1570 / 71–1627 / 28). He taught for a long time as a professor in the Holy Mosque in Mecca and was in contact with the Sherif Emir of Mecca Zaid ibn Muhsin (r. 1631–1667), to whom he also dedicated his world chronicle. In the year 1076 of the Hijra (= 1665/66 AD) he visited Medina with him. For the sherif Samd ibn Zaid (r. 1667–1672) al-ʿIsāmī wrote a Qasīda in which he praised the ruler. Among his students was the Sherif Barakāt ibn Muhammad (ruled 1672–1682). To praise it, he also wrote his own Qasīda.

Al-ʿIsāmī died on the morning of the 24th Jumādā l-auwal 1111 (= November 17, 1699) in Mecca.

Works

The world chronicle

Simṭ an-nuǧūm al-ʿawālī fī Anbāʾ al-awāʾil wa-t-tawālī ("The chain of high stars over the news of the first and subsequent generations") is a world chronicle that deals with the history of the city of Mecca and all those great powers to which Mecca had a political relationship in its history. Al-ʿIsāmī began writing the work in 1682 and continued work on it until 1688.

The work is divided into a preface ( muqaddima ), four parts and an overlong final part ( ḫātima ):

• The preface deals with the importance of historiography and the motives that drove him to write his book, the commission to write the work of Zaid ibn Muhsin, as well as the 148 source texts from which he has compiled his work.
• Part 1 deals with the family tree of the Prophet , Qisas al-Anbiyā ' , the history of the Jāhilīya and the conditions of Mecca before Islam.
• Part 2 has seven chapters and includes the life of the prophet .
• Part 3 deals with the time of the Right Guided Caliphs .
• Part 4 is divided into seven chapters and treated therein (1) the Umayyads -State, (2) the Abbasiden -State, (3) the Fatimides -State, (4) the Ayyubids -State, (5) the state of the Turkic Mamluken , (6) the Circassian Mamluk state , (7) the Ottoman state .
• The final part is divided into three chapters. It deals with (1) the Tālibids, i.e. the descendants of Abū Tālib ibn ʿAbd al-Muttalib , with their family trees and prominent personalities, (2) those Tālibids who have claimed power for themselves, and (3) the Tālibid rulers from Mecca, d. H. the Sherifs of Mecca, with the three dynasties of the Sulaymanids, Hashimids and Qatadids. The last ruler mentioned is the Sherif Ahmad ibn Ghālib (1688–1690). This final part of the chronicle is of particularly high value as a source of local history , as it contains a lot of information about the Sherifs and their relations with the Ottoman state as well as the architectural, social and everyday history of Mecca. In many places the author reports on facts that he has experienced himself or that have been reported to him orally.

Manuscripts of the work are kept in Berlin, Vienna, Paris, London and Patna . A first printed edition appeared in 1960 in al-Maṭbaʿa al-Salafīya in Cairo in four volumes. A four-volume print edition edited by ʿĀdil Aḥmad ʿAbd al-Mauǧūd and ʿAlī Muḥammad Muʿauwaḍ was published by Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmīya in Beirut in 1998.

Other works

• Qaid al-awābid min al-fawāʾid wa-al-ʿawāʾid wa-al-zawāʾid mimmā yataʿallaqu bi-l-Qurʾān al-maǧīd . Collection of lessons learned from the Koran . A print edition edited by Aḥmad ibn Fāris al-Sallūm was published by Dār Ibn Ḥazm in Beirut in 2018.
• al-Ġurar al-bahīya šuraiḥ al-Ḫazraǧīya Work on Arabic metrics .
• Poem about the places in Mecca and the surrounding area, where the prayer will be answered.

literature

• Wilhelm Ahlwardt: Directory of the Arabic manuscripts of the Royal Library in Berlin. A. Asher & co., Berlin 1887. Vol. IX, pp. 83-86 (No. 9478) Digitized
• Carl Brockelmann : "History of Arabic Literature". Volume II. 2nd edition. Brill, Leiden 1949. p. 502. - Supplementary volume II. Brill, Leiden, 1943. p. 516.
• ʿAbdallāh Mirdād Abū l-Ḫair: al-Muḫtaṣar min kitāb Našr an-naur wa-z-zahr fī tarāǧim afāḍil Makka min al-qarn al-ʿāšir ilā l-qarn ar-rābiʿ ʿašar. Edited by Muḥammad Saʿīd al-ʿĀmūdī, and Aḥmad ʿAlī. 2nd Edition. ʿĀlam al-maʿrifa, Jeddah 1986. pp. 326f. Digitized
• Muḥammad al-Ḥabīb al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka: min al-qarn aṯ-ṯāliṯ al-hiǧrī ila 'l-qarn aṯ-ṯāliṯ ʿašar . Muʾassasat al-Furqān li-t-turāṯ al-islāmī, Mekka, 1994. pp. 364-367. Digitized
• Muḥammad Amīn Ibn-Faḍlallāh al-Muḥibbī: Nafḥat ar-raiḥāna wa-rašḥat ṭilāʿ al-ḥāna . Ed. ʿAbdalfattāḥ Muḥammad al-Ḥulw. 5 volumes. ʿIsā al-Bābā al-Ḥalabī, Cairo, 1967–1969. Vol. IV, pp. 123-128. Digitized
• Muḥammad al-Ḫalīl al-Murādī: Silk ad-durar fī aʿyān al-qarn aṯ-ṯānī ʿašar Dār al-kutub al-islāmī, Cairo, approx. 1988. Vol. III, p. 139. Digitized
• Ḫair ad-Dīn az-Zirikli : al-Aʿlām . 8 vol. 10th edition Beirut 1992. Vol. IV, p. 157f. Digitized

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka . 1994, p. 365.
2. ↑ Parts of it are in al-Muḥibbī: Nafḥat ar-raiḥāna . 1967-69, Vol. IV, pp. 124-126 reproduced.
3. ↑ Al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka . 1994, p. 365.
4. ↑ Cf. the excerpts from it in al-Murādī: Silk ad-durar . 1988, Vol. III, p. 139.
5. ^ Abū l-Ḫair: al-Muḫtaṣar . 1986, p. 327.
6. ↑ Al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka . 1994, p. 365f.
7. ↑ Al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka . 1994, p. 366f.
8. ↑ Al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka . 1994, p. 365.
9. ↑ It is also available here as a digitized version.
10. ↑ Al-Hīla: At-Tārīḫ wa-'l-muʾarriḫūn bi-Makka . 1994, p. 366.