al-Nuaymi
- Died
- 927 AH
- Born in
- Damascus
'Abd al-Qadir ibn Muhammad al-Nu'aymi (845–927 AH / 1441–1521 CE) was a Syrian Shafi'i jurist, hadith scholar, and historian of Damascus, best known for his institutional and topographical chronicle al-Daris fi Tarikh al-Madaris (The Obliterated Remains in the History of Colleges).
Life and Education
Muhyi al-Din Abu al-Mafakhir 'Abd al-Qadir ibn Muhammad ibn 'Umar ibn Muhammad ibn Yusuf ibn 'Abd Allah ibn 'Abd al-'Azim ibn Khuld ibn Nu'aym al-Nu'aymi al-Dimashqi al-As'ardi was born in Damascus at the call to Friday prayer on 11 Shawwal 845 AH—or, by other reports, 12 Shawwal 845 AH or in the year 846 AH—in Hikr al-Turbah al-Dhahabiyyah near the Manjak Mosque outside Bab al-Jabiya. His mother was the foster child of the Mamluk governor Nasir al-Din al-Tankizi. He bore several additional honorifics and patronymics, including Zayn al-Din, Abu al-Barakat, and Abu Salih.
He received his early religious education in Damascus, reading the Quran under Shihab al-Din al-Maqdisi and his son Ibrahim, the imams of the Manjak Mosque. He studied Arabic and legal theory under Zayn al-Din al-Shawi, reading works including al-Minhaj and the didactic poetry of al-Birmawi. Al-Nu'aymi went on to study hadith, jurisprudence, and historical disciplines under a circle of prominent Damascene teachers, maintaining a close scholarly association with Burhan al-Din Ibrahim al-Naji, Zayn al-Din 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Khalil (known as Ibn Salamah al-Qabuni), the Shafi'i mufti Shams al-Din Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Razzaq al-Arihi, Zayn al-Din Khattab al-Ghazzawi, and Shams al-Din Muhammad al-'Awfi al-Mizzi.
Judicial Career and Scholarship
Al-Nu'aymi served as a deputy judge (na'ib qadi) within the Shafi'i judiciary of Damascus and was recognized as one of the leading hadith scholars and local chroniclers of his generation. Among the students who attended his teaching sessions was the Damascene historian and polymath Ibn Tulun al-Dimashqi.
His primary scholarly contribution lies in the preservation of the urban, institutional, and biographical history of Damascus during the Mamluk and transition-to-Ottoman eras. His major work, al-Daris fi Tarikh al-Madaris (alternatively entitled Tanbih al-Talib wa-Irshad al-Daris fi ma bi-Dimashq min al-Jawami' wa-al-Madaris), is a survey recording the city's colleges, endowments, founding deeds, and resident scholars across multiple centuries; it was later abridged by 'Abd al-Basit al-'Almawi (d. 981 AH). Al-Nu'aymi also compiled a chronological biographical record of his contemporaries entitled al-'Unwan fi Dabt Mawalid wa-Wafayat Ahl al-Zaman.
Death
Al-Nu'aymi died in Damascus in 927 AH (1521 CE; a variant source places the year as 1520 CE) and was buried in the city's Turbat al-Humriyyah cemetery.
Answer updated
List of Works
al-Daris fi Tarikh al-Madaris (The Obliterated Remains in the History of Colleges) is a topographical and biographical work on the colleges, religious endowments, and educational institutions of Damascus. It surveys the city's educational establishments, their locations, founding patrons, endowment terms, and the scholars and professors who held teaching appointments in them over the centuries.