On the basis of a newly discovered manuscript this edition offers the most comprehensive bibliography of the enormous output of the fifteenth-century scholar Ibn ʿAbd al-Hādī – enlarging our view of his scholarly contribution and correcting numerous mistakes in this regard. This edition is thus essential reading for all those interested in the writerly world of Damascus and the scholarly world of the late fifteenth century, especially with regard to the Ḥanbalī tradition and ḥadīth scholarship. In particular, linking the titles of his books with the extant manuscripts in libraries around the world opens new perspectives to these scholarly worlds. At the same time this edition offers a new framework to studying social history with reference to documents and the material culture of the book.

Said Aljoumani, Ph.D. (2010), Cairo University, is Researcher at the Freie Universität Berlin since 2017. His main areas of expertise are the history of libraries and manuscript studies. Among his publications is A madrasa Library in Aleppo at the Dawn of the Ottoman Era (Orient Institute Beirut, 2020).

Konrad Hirschler is Professor of Islamic Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin. His research concentrates on Egypt and Syria in the Ayyubid and Mamluk periods with a focus on social and cultural history. Among his books is Medieval Damascus: Plurality and Diversity in an Arabic Library (Edinburgh University Press, 2016).

All interested in Islamic Studies, and especially in history of the book and history of libraries, will find this work of great interest. The focus on the Ḥanbalī heritage will appeal in particular to those interested in Hanbalism.