Wathīma ibn Mūsā (died 9 December 851), nicknamed al-Washshāʾ ('trader in embroideries'), was a Persian Muslim historian and silk trader.
Born in the city of Fasā, Wathīma moved first to Baṣra, then to Egypt and to al-Andalus before returning to Egypt, where he settled in the city of Fusṭāṭ. He studied ḥadīth (traditions) and, according to Ibn al-Faraḍī, this was the purpose of his travels to the West. He wrote a Kitāb fī Akhbār al-ridda, an Arabic account of the great apostasy of 632. It is a lost work, although at least 110 passages from it are quoted by other authors, including Ibn Khallikān, Ibn Shākir al-Kutubī, Yāqūt al-Rūmī and Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalānī. It was praised for its literary quality and its breadth by Ibn al-ʿImād.
Wathīma died in Fusṭāṭ. He had a son, ʿUmāra ibn Wathīma, who was born in Fusṭāṭ. The Kitāb badʾ al-khalq wa-qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, a collection of legends of the prophets, is attributed to ʿUmāra, but is more probably the work of Wathīma.
Notes
- Khoury 2002 gives his full name as Wathīma ibn Mūsā ibn al-Furāt al-Fārisī al-Fasawī al-Azhar al-Ghanī.
- Ibn Khallikān's entry on Wathīma in his biographical dictionary can be found in Mac Guckin de Slane 1868, pp. 647–656.
References
- ^ Khoury 2002.
- Mac Guckin de Slane 1868, p. 648.
- Blatherwick 2016, pp. 70–71.
Bibliography
- Blatherwick, Helen (2016). Prophets, Gods and Kings in Sīrat Sayf ibn Dhī Yazan: An Intertextual Reading of an Egyptian Popular Epic. Brill.
- Khoury, Raif Georges (2002). "Wat̲h̲īma b. Mūsā". In Bearman, P. J.; Bianquis, Th.; Bosworth, C. E.; van Donzel, E. & Heinrichs, W. P. (eds.). The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Volume XI: W–Z. Leiden: E. J. Brill. pp. 179–180. ISBN 978-90-04-12756-2.
- Mac Guckin de Slane, William, ed. (1868). Ibn Khallikan's Biographical Dictionary. Vol. 3. Paris.
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