Aḥmad al-Rāzī (April 888 – 1 November 955), full name Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Rāzī al-Kinānī,[1] was a Muslim historian of Persian origin who wrote the first narrative history of Islamic rule in Spain.
[2] Later Muslim historians considered him the father of Islamic historiography in Spain and the first to provide a narrative framework rather than bare facts.
[1] As a child he had the same tutor as the future caliph, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III, which provided him with a connection to the royal court.
He came to work for the central government and used his access to official documents and archives to compile his chronicle.
[5] An original translation from Arabic into Portuguese of only a part of Aḥmad's chronicle was made at the court of King Denis of Portugal around 1300.
The Castilian version of the Akhbār mulūk, called the Crónica del moro Rasis (Chronicle of the Moor al-Rāzī), dates to about 1425/1430.