al-Mashyakha al-Baghdadiyya li-Abi Tahir al-Silafi (1-35)
- Author died
- 576 AH
- Editions
- ed. al-Muzaydi
Al-Mashyakha al-Baghdadiyya (also known as Mu‘jam Shuyukh Baghdad, Tarikh al-Muhaddithin bi-Baghdad, or Mashyakhat al-Muhaddithin bi-Baghdad) is a biographical hadith collection compiled by the scholar Abu Tahir al-Silafi (d. 576 AH / 1180 CE) to document his teachers in Baghdad and the transmissions he received from them .
Composition and Scope
Al-Silafi collected the material during his residency in Baghdad, which he first entered in Shawwal 493 AH, and he transmitted the work after settling permanently in Alexandria . The book spans thirty-five parts (ajza’) and contains entries for over six hundred Baghdadi teachers, alongside occasional mentions of scholars from outside Baghdad when contextually relevant . In total, the collection encompasses nearly three thousand texts, including prophetic hadiths, companion traditions (athar), poetry of wisdom and asceticism, and historical anecdotes and exhortations .
Method and Topographical Value
For each teacher, al-Silafi typically records their names, patronymics (kunya), and selected narrations or extracts from their books . Beyond its primary value as a hadith source preserving rare isnad chains and extracts from lost works and vanished hadith booklets, the compilation serves as an important topographical record of late-fifth-century AH Baghdad . Al-Silafi routinely specifies the precise quarters, lanes, markets, mosques, and homes where he heard narrations across both the eastern and western sides of the city, uniquely preserving the names of several local sites not mentioned by other geographers, such as Darb Salih, Darb Sharik, Darb Ja‘far in al-Karkh, Mahalat Ibnat al-Murji, and Mahalat al-Najiyya .
Manuscript Transmission
The work has been preserved in multiple manuscript witnesses:
- A complete copy preserved at the El Escorial Library in Madrid (MS 1783), comprising 347 folios across thirty-five parts, transcribed in 609 AH by Ibrahim ibn Uthman ibn Isa ibn Dirbas .
- An incomplete manuscript at the Feyzullah Efendi Library in Turkey (MS 532), preserving parts 1 to 12 across 92 folios, transcribed by Abu Muhammad Abd al-Wahhab ibn Zafir ibn Ibrahim, known as Ibn Rawaj .
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