Ibn Bashkuwal

Life

His ancestry was Arab and was a descendant of al-Ansar- he was known as Ibn Bashkuwāl ("son of Pasqual") in the Valencia region. His first teacher was his father (d.1139), to whom he dedicates a section in his biographical work. He studied with the most famous scholars of his time: Ibn al-'Arabī al-Ma'āfirī and the lawyer Abūl-Walīd ibn Ruschd (died 1126), the grandfather of the philosopher Averroës. In his hometown he worked as a consulting lawyer (faqīh mušāwar) and for a short time as deputy Qādī in Seville under Ibn al-'Arabī. It appears he never travelled to the East and his scholarship derived from the Andalusian-Islamic tradition. His biographer Ibn Abbār (d. Jan 1260) mentions 41 scholars in Córdoba and Seville, with whom he studied. His library held works by authors from the Islamic East; of which is the K. as-Siyar from Abū Ishāq al-Fazārī, on whose title page he is documented as the owner of the work.

He died in January 1183 and was buried in the cemetery known then as Ibn 'Abbās Scholars’ Cemetery in Córdoba