Abd al-Wahid al-Marrakushi

Abu Muhammad Abd al-Wahid al-Marrakushi was a Maghribi chronicler of the Almohad period, born in Marrakush on 7 Rabi II 581/8 July 1185. The encyclopaedia's entry, headed "RAKUSHI" in the printed text (the heading is clipped), is signed by E. Levi-Provencal. ¹

He left Marrakush for Fez to study and returned several times to the Almohad capital before going to Spain. He stayed in Seville in 605/1208-9 and in Cordova for two years. After a short visit to Marrakush he settled at Seville, where the Almohad governor took him into service. At the end of 613/1217 he went east to Ifriqiya and Egypt; in 617/1220 he was in Upper Egypt and in 620/1223 in Mecca, and it seems he remained in the East until his death. ¹

In 621/1224, probably in Baghdad, he compiled al-Mu'jib fi Talkhis Akhbar al-Maghrib, which R. Dozy published at Leiden in 1847 (second edition 1881) as The History of the Almohads, and E. Fagnan translated into French (Algiers, 1893). The encyclopaedia says the work gives an often interesting summary of the Muslim West up to the Mu'minid period, treats that dynasty at greater length from personal memory, and is rich in literary history, especially of the period of the party kings in Spain. ¹