Communicating a Biography: A Comparison of the Maghribi-Andalusi and Mashriqi Sources on al-Qāḍī ʿIyāḍ

The compilation of biographies was one of the most common and important intellectual activities in the premodern world. In Islam, a large number of biographical dictionaries devoted to poets, ʿulamāʾ, aʿyān (notable people), and others have been produced over the centuries and continue to be written even today.1 We can ascertain various things from biographies, not only about the individual being described but also about the particular group(s) of people to which they belonged. As such, many modern studies of medieval biographies have been produced to help further knowledge of aspects of social and intellectual history. However, when researching the life of an individual, we often come across multiple sources. These sources are sometimes contradictory in nature, even though they relate to the same person. In such cases, how should we make sense of the differences between the texts? Which information – if any – should we consider more reliable or plausible? Examining the communication and development or alteration of biographical information over time and space may help us answer these questions, and this paper will do so through a case-study of al-Qāḍī ʿIyāḍ (d. 544 H/1149 CE). Al-Qāḍī ʿIyāḍ was one of the most famous jurists of the Mālikī law-school and a renowned ḥadīth scholar in the medieval Maghrib. His life was included in a number of biographical dictionaries after his death not only in the Islamic West but also in the East, despite the fact that he never made the ḥajj, visited the Mashriq, or had many teachers or students there. This is rather interesting because, although the people of the Mashriq might not have generally shown an interest in someone who had limited involvement with them, a certain