Gorke, Andreas

Aktham b. Ṣayfī is a semi-legendary figure of pre-Islamic Arabia. The sources portray him as a judge, sage, and poet, from the Usayyid branch of the Tamīm tribe, but otherwise very few details of his life are known with certainty. He is counted among the muʿammarūn —people famou…

Al-ʿAbbās b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib (d. c. 32/653) was an uncle of the prophet Muḥammad and the eponym of the ʿAbbāsid dynasty. al-ʿAbbās was a half-brother of the Prophet's father ʿAbdallāh. His mother was Nutayla bt. Janāb from al-Namir, a tribe of the Rabīʿa confederation. al-ʿAbbā…

Al-Barāʾ b. ʿĀzib b. al-Ḥārith (d. c.72/691) was a Companion of the prophet Muḥammad, an important transmitter of his sayings, and a military commander during the early Islamic conquests. He was born about ten years before the hijra (c. 612 C.E.) in Medina as a member of the Ban…

Al-Barāʾ b. Maʿrūr (d. 622 C.E.) was one of the leaders of the Anṣār, the Medinan helpers of the prophet Muḥammad. His fame mainly rests on two episodes: he is said to have been the first to pray in the direction of the Kaʿba when Muḥammad still favoured Jerusalem as the qibla ,…

ʿAbdallāh b. ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb (d. 73/693) was a Companion and brother-in-law of the Prophet Muḥammad and one of the most important transmitters of his sayings. He is often referred to simply as Ibn ʿUmar. ʿAbdallāh b. ʿUmar was born c. 610 C.E., the first son of the caliph-to…

ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. Ḥabīb b. Abī ʿUbayda (or ʿAbda) al-Fihrī (d. 137/755) was a military commander and governor in the province of Ifrīqiya at the end of the Umayyad and beginning of the ʿAbbāsid empire. A great-grandson of ʿUqba b. Nāfiʿ (d. 63/683), the general who had led the c…