Sayf ibn Umar

Saif ibn ʿ Umar (Arabic سيف بن عمر, ʿ Umar ibn Saif DMG ) was a Muslim historian of the early Abbasid period and one of the main authorities in the Arab representations about the early days of Islam. Besides the fact that he has lived in Kufa and belonged to the Arab tribe of Tamim, no biographical data about him are known.

Saif ibn ʿ Umar importance especially through his book Kitaab al - Futuh al - Kabīr wa -r- ridda obtained, in which he was compiling reports on the Ridda wars and conquests. This book, which has survived not independently later formed one of the main sources of the reports about this time in the world history of al-Tabari. Even the Syrian historian Ibn ʿ Asaakir used it in his "History of the city of Damascus ."

The reliability of reports Saif has always been controversial. Even from Muslim tradition scholars, he was accused that he reports have pushed into the mouth informants, to which he appealed. Julius Wellhausen did from the entire Saif reports as per - tamīmische tendency literature. A " rehabilitation " of Saif took place only in 1990 by Ella Landau - Tasseron. It showed that his reports not only it aimed to raise the fame of their own tribe, but certainly also addressed the benefits of other Arab tribes. They showed, moreover, that Saif has in turn resorted to other Arab sources that already existed in writing at the time.