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Hisham ibn al-Kalbi

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Not to be confused with Ibn Hisham.
Hishām ibn al-Kalbī
Arabic calligraphy of Hishām ibn al-Kalbī
Personal
Born737 CE
Kufa, Iraq
Died819 CE
ReligionShi'ite
Parent
Main interest(s)History
Notable idea(s)
Notable work(s)Jamharat al-Ansab, Kitab al-Asnam
Senior posting
Influenced

Hishām ibn al-Kalbī (Arabic: هشام بن الكلبي), 737 AD – 819 AD/204 AH, also known as Ibn al-Kalbi (إبن الكلبي), was an Arab historian.[1] His full name was Abu al-Mundhir Hisham ibn Muhammad ibn al-Sa'ib ibn Bishr al-Kalbi. Born in Kufa,[2] he spent much of his life in Baghdad. Like his father, he collected information about the genealogies and history of the ancient Arabs.

One of the notable works of Ibn al-Kalbi is the Book of Idols (Kitab al-Asnam), which aims to document the veneration of idols and pagan sanctuaries in different regions and among different tribes in pre-Islamic Arabia.[3] In this work, Hisham posited a genealogical link between Ishmael and the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and put forth the idea that all Arabs were descended from Ishmael.[1] He relied heavily on the ancient oral traditions of the Arabs, but also quoted writers who had access to Biblical and Palmyran sources.[1] According to the Fihrist, he wrote 140 works. His account of the genealogies of the Arabs is continually quoted in the Kitab al-Aghani.[3]

Scholarship

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In 1966, Werner Caskel compiled a two volume study of Ibn al-Kalbi's Jamharat al-Nasab ("The Abundance of Kinship") entitled Das genealogische Werk des Hisam Ibn Muhammad al Kalbi ("The Genealogical Works of Hisham ibn Muhammad al-Kalbi").[4] It contains a prosopographic register of every individual mentioned in the genealogy in addition to more than three hundred genealogical tables based on the contents of the text.

Works

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Arabic Wikisource has original text related to this article:
  • The Book of Idols (Kitab Al-Asnam)
  • The Abundance of Kinship (Jamharat Al-Ansab)

References

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  1. ^ a b c ""Arabia" in Ancient History". Centre for Sinai. Archived from the original on 2008-11-19. Retrieved 2009-04-16.
  2. ^ Ibrahim, Ayman S. (2021-02-09). Conversion to Islam: Competing Themes in Early Islamic Historiography. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-753071-9.
  3. ^ a b  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Thatcher, Griffithes Wheeler (1911). "Ḥishām ibn al-Kalbī". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 13 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 525–526.
  4. ^ Caskel, Werner; Strenziok, Gert (1966). Ǧamharat an-nasab: das genealogische Werk des Hišām Ibn-Muḥammad al-Kalbī. Leiden: Brill.
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