Abū Muḥammad ʿAbdallāh b. Aḥmad Ibn al-Khashshāb (b. 492/1099, d. 3 Ramaḍān 567/29 April 1172) was a Baghdadī polymath and an avid collector of books. His birth year is given only by Ibn Khallikān (d. 681/1282) (3:102-4). ʿImād al-Dīn al-Iṣfahānī (d. 597/1201), a student of al-Khashshāb, gives a variant death date of 568/1173 (3/1:7-18). In addition to linguistics, Ibn al-Khashshāb studied adab (literature), farāʾiḍ (division of inheritances), mathematics, and ḥadīth (sayings of the Prophet). He