About: Ibn Faris

Abū al-Ḥusayn Aḥmad ibn Fāris ibn Zakariyyā ibn Muḥammad ibn Ḥabīb al-Rāzī (Arabic: أبو الحسين أحمد بن فارس بن زكريا بن محمد بن حبيب الرازي, died Ray, Iran 395/1004) was a Persian linguist, scribe, scholar, philologist and lexicographer, As well as bearing the epithet al-Rāzī ('meaning 'from Ray'), ibn Fāris was also known variously by the epithets al-Shāfiʿī, al-Mālikī, al-lughawī ('the linguist'), al-naḥwī ('the grammarian'), al-Qazwīnī ('from Qazvin') and (possibly inaccurately) al-Zahrāwī ('from al-Zahrāʾ'). He is noted for compiling two of the early dictionaries to organise words alphabetically rather than according to the word's rhyming pattern. He was primarily associated with Ray. Initially, he was an adherent of the Shafi'i madhhab, but later switched to the Maliki.