Al-Nuwayri

Al-Nuwayrī, full name Shihāb al-Dīn Aḥmad bin ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Nuwayrī (Arabic: شهاب الدين أحمد بن عبد الوهاب النويري, 5 April 1279 – 5 June 1333) was an Egyptian Muslim historian and civil servant of the Bahri Mamluk dynasty. He is most notable for his compilation of a 9,000-page encyclopedia of the Mamluk era, titled The Ultimate Ambition in the Arts of Erudition (نهاية الأرب في فنون الأدب, Nihāyat al-arab fī funūn al-adab), which pertained to zoology, anatomy, history, chronology, amongst others.¹ He is also known for his extensive work regarding the Mongols' conquest of Syria. Al-Nuwayri started his encyclopedia around the year 1314 and completed it in 1333.²

Life

The name Al-Nuwayri is a nisba referring to the village of Al-Nuwayra in present-day Beni Suef Governorate. Al-Nuwayri was born 5 April 1279, in Akhmim, Egypt.³ His family's lineage traced back to Abu Bakr al-Siddiq through his great-grandson Talha al-Khayr who was honored with the title Sultan al-Madinah for his elevated station of scholarship amongst the Tabi'un.⁴ For most of his childhood, he lived in Qus in Upper Egypt, where he studied with Ibn Daqiq al-'Id. He later studied at in , specializing in the study of the and the , in addition to history. Skilled in , he reportedly made a copy of which he sold for 1000 . He worked as a civil servant in the administration of Sultan starting aged 23, serving in various roles including property manager for the Sultan and superintendent of army finances in . At some point after 1312, he retired from government service and took a job copying manuscripts in order to support himself while compiling his encyclopedia. He died on 5 June 1333, in Cairo.