Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn Abī Zarʿ al-Fāsī ( ar, أبو الحسن علي بن أبي زرع الفاسي) (d. between 1310 and 1320) is the commonly presumed original author of the popular and influential medieval history of
Morocco
Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria ...
known as ''
Rawd al-Qirtas'',
[''Encyclopedia of Arabic literature: A-J'', Vol.1, Ed. Julie Scott Meisami and Paul Starkey, (Routledge, 1998), 307.] said to have been written at the instigation of
Marinid Sultan
Abu Sa'id Uthman II. His full
nasab is sometimes given as ''ibn Abd Allah ibn Abi Zar'' and sometimes as ''ibn Muhammad ibn Ahmad ibn Umar ibn Abi Zar''. The uncertainty about his name and authorship of the
Rawd is caused by the many variant manuscripts in circulation since the Middle Ages. Very little is known about his life except that he was evidently a scholar at
Fes
Fez or Fes (; ar, فاس, fās; zgh, ⴼⵉⵣⴰⵣ, fizaz; french: Fès) is a city in northern inland Morocco and the capital of the Fès-Meknès administrative region. It is the second largest city in Morocco, with a population of 1.11 mi ...
.
Notes
See also
*
Rawd al-Qirtas – references therein.
*Ahmed Siraj: ''L'Image de la Tingitane. L'historiographie arabe medievale et l'Antiquite nord-africaine''. École Française de Rome, 1995. . A brief biographical note gives references to articles (in Arabic) by Moroccan researchers.
14th-century Moroccan historians
Year of birth unknown
1310s deaths
People from Fez, Morocco
13th-century Moroccan historians
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