Aḥmad Ḥasībī-zādeh and Ibn Ṭūlūn MTMs
وقف المرحوم شمس الدين محمد بن طولون الحنفي على مدرسة ابي عمر في صالحية دمشق نجزه بعد الاستغلاس جناب احمد افندي حسيبي زاده اعطاه الل ٰه مراده في ٢ ذي القعدة سنة ١٢٦٥ ّMoreover, in both cases it is seconded on the lower left corner by another note, identifying Ḥasan b. Ibrāhīm al-Bayṭār al-Shāfiʿī (d. 1272/1856) as an owner of the manuscripts. Whereas the latter is well-identified, Ḥasībī-zādeh posed more of a concern. That is, initially. In fact, Linda Schatkowski-Schilcher’s Families in Politics allows us to establish Ḥasībī-zādeh’s identity. The name seems to refer to Aḥmad b. ʿAlī al-Ḥasībī (d. 1876), a member of an ashrāf family which had reached Damascus in the late 17th century. His father ʿAlī was instrumental in establishing the family’s elite status. Not only did he hold a deputy judgeship; he also changed the family’s name from al-ʿAṭṭār to al-Ḥasībī, which, according to Schatkowski-Schilcher, denoted nobility (209). Moreover, he married two of his daughters to members of the ʿAzm dynasty. The passage on Aḥmad al-Ḥasībī himself deserves being quoted at length:
ʿAli’s son Ahmad (1791/92 – 1876/77) was favored by the Ottoman government with a grant of land in different villages in the vicinity of Damascus, probably around Qatana, a short distance to the south-west and on the slopes of the Anti-Lebanon facing Damascus. It was he who was named to the majlis and remained there until 1860. It is, unfortunately, not revealed in the sources why the government favored Ahmad in this way. We may suppose that the land grant was similar to previous measures the government had taken to reward faithful service and to gain influential allies in Damascus. In any case, Ahmad became wealthy, moved the family residence from the quarter of ʿUqayba to that of Qanawat and reinforced ties with the ʿAzms by marrying his daughters into that family […]. Ahmad Hasibi was transported into exile […] in October 1860. He also returned […] after being transferred to Izmir and Istanbul where they were released. Nothing more appears in the sources about him in the years before his death in 1876/77 while on the pilgrimage. Linda Schatkowski-Schilcher. Families in Politics. 209.Although this is not much in terms of biographical information, it suffices to identify al-Ḥasībī’s status among the local elites as well as, as a result, his role in the transmission of the two Ibn Ṭūlūn manuscripts. Regarding the former, the addition of the honorifics “Efendī” and “-zādeh” bespeak this status. Regarding the latter, their purchase by al-Bayṭār occurred well before al-Ḥasībī’s fall from favor in the aftermath of 1860. Should we then assume that al-Ḥasībī was himself an owner? Or could we interpret the proximity of both annotations in a different way?