Ibn Idhari

Abū al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Idhāri al-Marrākushi (Arabic: أبو العباس أحمد ابن عذاري المراكشي‎) who lived in the late 13th and the early 14th century, was the author of an important medieval text (Al-Bayan al-Mughrib) on the history of the Maghreb (Morocco and Algeria) and Iberia written in 1312.^[1]

Little is known about the life of this author, who was born in Al-Andalus and lived in Marrakech. His history of the Maghreb and Iberia is widely regarded among modern researchers as containing valuable information not found elsewhere, including extracts from older works now lost.

Notes

1. This is the form of the name given by Dozy, Colin and Levi-Provençal, editors of the Arabic text of the Bayān, but Siraj (work cited below) gives his kunya and ism as Abū Abd Allah Muhammad

References

• Ahmed Siraj: L'Image de la Tingitane. L'historiographie arabe medievale et l'Antiquite nord-africaine. École Française de Rome, 1995. ISBN 2-7283-0317-7. Short biographical note.
• N. Levtzion & J.F.P. Hopkins, Corpus of early Arabic sources for West African history, Cambridge University Press, 1981, ISBN 0-521-22422-5 (reprint: Markus Wiener, Princeton, 2000, ISBN 1-55876-241-8). Short biographical note and English translation of extracts from Al-Bayan al-Mughrib.