Page 22 - 1..PRESENTATION (ENGLISH)
P. 22
22



because there is no specific mention of his knowledge of al-qirā’āt. There are cases in which

activity that might have fallen into the section Trans. y otros did not actually occur, for a variety
99
of reasons, and we have not noted that latent possibility.
The reader who consults HATA should be aware, first of all, of what is understood by
“Andalusi”: the term is applied to every individual whose biography appears in an Andalusi

biographical dictionary, whether that person was born in al-Andalus or was born elsewhere (min
al-ghurabā’) and later visited or settled in al-Andalus. 100 In this we follow the criterion

established by Ibn Ḥazm in his Risāla fī faḍl al-Andalus. Ibn Ḥazm affirmed that just as no

Andalusis would fail to claim Abū ᶜAlī al-Qālī, born in Baghdad, as one of their own, any of
them would exclude the poet Ibn Hānī’, who was born in al-Andalus and emigrated to North

Africa where he served the Fatimids, rivals of the Umayyads. Nonetheless HATA, wishing to
avoid “ideological censorship,” classifies also Ibn Hāni’ as an Andalusi. Because of successive

waves of immigration, especially to North Africa, many individuals bear Andalusi nisba-s and it
is difficult to establish whether or not they were born in al-Andalus. 101 Of others we know for

certain that they never set foot in the Iberian Peninsula: for example M. b. Ibr. al-Ābilī (of a

family originally from Ávila), among others. 102 We have also considered “Andalusis” those
authors or transmitters from al-Andalus who do not appear in any biographical dictionary but are

cited in a work by an Andalusi author. 103

The reader, on consulting the section Transmisiones (Trans.) y otros, must bear in mind
what has just been explained: what appears in that section depends on a variety of circumstances,

and one must therefore consult the source text for the data in order to determine just what kind of
information is found there. HATA readers should always consult the text mentioned in the


99 It was said of one ᶜālim that he lost all his possessions, including his books, when his ship was captured by
enemies: IGS, 229-230 (278).
100 Occasionally the information on possible ghurabā’ has been judged indecisive: such is the case of Abū l-ᶜArab
al-Tamīmī who, according to only one late source [MM, V, 150-51 (1690)], entered al-Andalus on business, and has
therefore not been included.
101 As in the case of ᶜA. b. M. b. Abī l-Q. Wazīr b. M. b. Abī Bakr b. Razīn; Abū l-Ḥ.; al-Tujībī al-Tūnisī al-Mursī,
who lived in Tunis between 628/1228 and 692/1292 and whose nisba indicates that he came from Murcia, where he
may have been born.
102 TIJ, 48-49, 54-58. Other descendants of Andalusis who were never in al-Andalus, and who therefore have been
excluded, are: al-Q. b. M. b. Yus. b. M. b. Yus. b. M.; Abū M.; al-Birzālī; al-Ishbīlī al-Dimashqī al-Shāfiᶜī ᶜAlam al-
dīn (665/1267-739/1339), S. b. M. b. M.; Abū ᶜAmr/Abū ᶜUth.; al-ᶜUqbānī [al-Tujībī] (720/1320-804/1401 or
811/1408) – who do appear in the Biblioteca de al-Andalus – and ᶜU. b. ᶜA. b. Aḥ.; Ibn al-Mulaqqin; al-Anṣārī al-
Wādī Āshī al-Andalusī; Sirāj al-dīn (d. 804/1401).
103 See note 29, above, for information that is not included in HATA.
   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27