Ibn Tawq
Shihāb al-Dīn Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad (1430–1509), called Ibn Ṭawq, was a Muslim notary and diarist from Damascus.
Life
[edit]Ibn Ṭawq was born in 1430[1] into a peasant family from the village of Jayrūd outside Damascus. He also held land in the predominantly Christian village of Maʿlūlā.[2] In Damascus, he lived near the Qaṣab Mosque in the quarter of Sūq Ṣārūjā just north of the Bāb al-Salāma gate to Old Damascus. His mother's family was from Damascus.[3] In 1498, he moved to Maʿlūlā, where he stayed for at least a year and a half whie his wife remained in Damascus.[4]
Ibn Ṭawq belonged to the middle class, owned an orchard and several female slaves.[3][5] He was a court clerk (kātib) and notary (shāhid).[3][4] He adhered to the Shāfiʿī school of law, but did not hesitate to seek justice from a Ḥanbalī judge.[2] He was just prominent enough to make it into the biographical dictionary of Najm al-Dīn al-Ghazzī, who describes him as a shaykh, imām (prayer leader), ʿālim (scholar) and muḥaddith (traditionist).[3]
Ibn Ṭawq was married twice. With his first wife, he had a son and two daughters. His second wife, who belonged to a prominent family, had a daughter from a previous marriage. At one point he divorced and remarried her on account of an oath he took. They had five daughters who died in childhood and one son.[6]
Ibn Ṭawq died in 1509.[1]
Diary
[edit]Ibn Ṭawq is known almost entirely for and through his Arabic diary, which he entitled Taʿlīq ("summary report").[1] The surviving portion of the diary covers the period from late 1480 to late 1501 with almost daily reports. Ibn Ṭawq also treated the diary as a sort of personal archive. According to Boaz Shoshan, there is "no comparable source for the pre-Ottoman era in terms of the density" of information than the Taʿlīq.[1] It is the only surviving diary from the Mamlūk Sultanate.[3]
Notes
[edit]- ^ a b c d Shoshan 2020, p. 1.
- ^ a b Shoshan 2020, p. 19.
- ^ a b c d e Wollina 2012.
- ^ a b Shoshan 2020, p. 20.
- ^ Shoshan 2020, pp. 33–35.
- ^ Shoshan 2020, pp. 29–32.
Bibliography
[edit]- Guo, Li (2008). "Review of Al-Taʿlīq, vols. 2–3, ed. Ǧaʿfar al-Muḥāǧir" (PDF). Mamlūk Studies Review. 12: 210–218.
- Ibn Ṭawq (2000–2007). Ǧaʿfar al-Muḥāǧir (ed.). Al-Taʿlīq: Yawmīyāt Shihāb al-Dīn Aḥmad. Presses de l'Ifpo. 4 vols.
- Shoshan, Boaz (2020). Damascus Life, 1480–1500: A Report of a Local Notary. Brill.
- Wollina, Torsten (2012). "A View from Within: Ibn Ṭawq's Personal Topography of 15th century Damascus". Bulletin d'études orientales. 61: 271–295.
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