[4] He was of Arab descent, from the Banu Khazraj tribe of Ansar as his nisba al-Ansārī al-Ifrīqī al-Misrī al-Khazrajī suggests.
Ibn Hajar reports that he was a judge (qadi) in Tripoli, Libya and Egypt and spent his life as clerk in the Diwan al-Insha', an office that was responsible among other things for correspondence, archiving and copying.
[5] Fück assumes to be able to identify him with Muḥammad b. Mukarram, who was one of the secretaries of this institution (the so called Kuttāb al-Inshāʾ) under Qalawun.
Lisān al-ʿArab [ar] (لسان العرب, "Tongue of Arabs") was completed by Ibn Manzur in 1290.
Occupying 20 printed book volumes (in the most frequently cited edition), it is the best known dictionary of the Arabic language,[6] as well as one of the most comprehensive.