Qissat al-Iskandar

The Qiṣṣat al-Iskandar (fully the Qiṣṣat al-Iskandar wa-mā fīhā min al-amr al-ʿadjīb, or "The story of Alexander and the wonderful things it contains") is the earliest narrative of Alexander the Great in the tradition of the Alexander Romance genre in the Arabic language. It was composed by ‘Umara ibn Zayd (also spelled Omâre Ebn-Zeyd) (767-815) between the late 8th to the early 9th century as a recension on the Syriac Alexander Legend. It is not to be confused with the Qissat Dhulqarnayn or the Sirat al-Iskandar.[1][2][3]

The text offers a chain of transmission going back to the earliest days of Islam, claiming to rely on transmitters including Ka'b al-Ahbar, Ibn Abbas, Hasan al-Basri, Ibn Ishaq and others.[1]

  1. ^ a b Donzel, Emeri Johannes van; Schmidt, Andrea Barbara; Ott, Claudia (2009). Gog and Magog in early syriac and islamic sources: Sallam's quest for Alexander's wall. Brill's Inner Asian Library. Leiden: Brill. pp. 176–178. ISBN 978-90-04-17416-0.
  2. ^ Friedländer, Israel (1913). Die Chadhirlegende und der Alexanderroman: Eine sagengeschichtliche und literarhistorische Untersuchung. Leipzig. pp. 129–162.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  3. ^ Abbott, Nabia (1957). Studies in Arabic Literary Papyri I: Historical Texts. Chicago. pp. 50–56.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)