Tarikh Ibn Muin - Riwayat al-Duri
- Author died
- 233 AH
- Editions
- Center for Scientific Research and Islamic Heritage Revival
Tarikh Ibn Ma'in – Riwayat al-Duri (The History of Ibn Ma'in: Transmission of al-Duri) is an early foundational source for hadith transmitter criticism (al-jarh wa-l-ta'dil) containing the evaluations, biographical information, and critical opinions of the Baghdadi hadith scholar Yahya ibn Ma'in (d. 233 AH / 848 CE), compiled and transmitted by his student Abbas ibn Muhammad al-Duri (185–271 AH / 801–884 CE).
Nature and Scope
Yahya ibn Ma'in did not author an independently composed biographical work himself; rather, the material preserved in his name represents collections of questions (su'alat) posed to him by his students regarding narrators and hadith evaluations, which were subsequently compiled into works bearing his name. Al-Duri studied extensively under Ibn Ma'in, accompanying him and recording his direct assessments of transmitters into a substantial volume. Al-Duri's recension is the most famous and comprehensive among the various student transmissions of Ibn Ma'in's critical statements. Its authority was widely recognized among traditional scholars; Ibn Abd al-Barr remarked that they possessed the entirety of Ibn Ma'in's Tarikh through the transmission of al-Duri.
Arrangement and Transmission
In its initial transmission, parts of the text were recorded as unordered question-and-answer exchanges without chapter categorization or alphabetical indexing. The work was later systematically rearranged and ordered alphabetically (huruf al-mu'jam) by Abu Sa'id Ibn al-A'rabi. The text was transmitted across Islamic scholarship through multiple chains of narration, being preserved by authorities such as Abu Ali al-Ghassani, Abu Umar ibn Abd al-Barr, Abu Muhammad al-Asili, and Muhammad ibn Makhlad al-Attar.
Modern Editions
The work has been edited and published in modern scholarly editions:
- An edition prepared and arranged by Ahmad Muhammad Nur Sayf, published in 1399 AH / 1979 CE by the Centre for Scientific Research and Islamic Heritage Revival at King Abdulaziz University in Makkah.
- An edition prepared by Abu Umar Muhammad ibn Ali al-Azhari, published in Cairo in 1434 AH.
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