Abū ʿAmr ʿAbd al-Raḥmān b. ʿAmr al-Awzāʿī (88-157/707-74), an influential Syrian legal scholar and theologian, was born in or near Baalbek, in present-day eastern Lebanon. His nisba is derived either from the name of the Damascus suburb of al-Awzāʿ where he lived much of his life, or from his purported descent from the Yemeni tribe of al-Awzāʿ. Al-Awzāʿī's father died when he was quite young, after which he moved to Beirut with his mother. From Beirut he eventually travelled, possibly