Tuhfat al-Umara fi Tarikh al-Wuzara
- Author died
- 448 AH
- Editions
- Maktabat al-A'yan
Tuhfat al-Umara fi Tarikh al-Wuzara (The Masterpiece of Princes on the History of Viziers) is a biographical and administrative history written by the Baghdad bureaucrat and historian Hilal ibn al-Muhsin al-Sabi (359–448 AH / 970–1056 CE), devoted to the chronicles and affairs of the Abbasid viziers .
Scope and Content
The work was conceived as a historical continuation of the earlier treatises on viziers and secretaries composed by Abu Bakr al-Suli and Muhammad ibn Abdus al-Jahshiyari . It documents the biographies, conduct, and official administration of the Abbasid viziers, beginning with the accounts of the vizier Ali ibn Muhammad ibn al-Furat . Al-Sabi drew upon state records and court knowledge acquired in part through his family background and his tenure heading the chancery (diwan al-insha) in Baghdad .
Alternative Titles and Early Reception
Classical authorities cited the work under variant titles. Ibn Khallikan recorded seeing a single volume by al-Sabi compiling entertaining anecdotes and rare accounts concerning eminent figures, which was titled Kitab al-Amathil wa-al-A'yan wa-Muntada al-Awatif wa-al-Ihsan (The Book of Exemplars and Notables and the Assembly of Benevolence and Kindness) . Yaqut al-Hamawi similarly noted the book under that title, describing it as an enjoyable work containing accounts and traditions reported from notables and dignitaries . Ali ibn Zafir al-Azdi referenced it in Bada'i al-Bada'ih as al-A'yan wa-al-Amthal .
Preservation and Modern Editions
The complete text of the work has not survived; only the initial portion was preserved, with biographies of several viziers lost .
- It was first published by the British orientalist Henry Frederick Amedroz in Beirut at the Catholic Press in 1904 . Amedroz provided an English introduction of roughly forty pages, annotations, indexes of persons and places, and a biographical sketch of al-Sabi drawn largely from Sibt Ibn al-Jawzi . Attached to the end of this edition was the surviving eighth part of al-Sabi's chronicle (Dhayl Tarikh Thabit ibn Sinan), covering the years 389–393 AH .
- Additional surviving quires were later uncovered and published by Mikha'il Awwad in Baghdad in 1948 under the title Aqsam Da'i'ah min Kitab Tuhfat al-Umara (Lost Sections from the Book Tuhfat al-Umara) .
- A critical edition edited by Abd al-Sattar Ahmad Farraj was published in Cairo in 1958 under the title al-Wuzara aw Tuhfat al-Umara fi Tarikh al-Wuzara . A facsimile reprint was later issued in Baghdad in 1962 .
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