Nawawi (Abu Zakariyya Ibn Sharaf un-Nawawi) (1233 - 1278), Arabian writer, was born at Nawa near Damascus.

In the latter city he studied from his eighteenth year, and there, after making the pilgrimage in 1253, he settled as a private scholar until 1267, when he succeeded Abu Shama as professor of tradition at the Ashrafiyya school. He died at Nawa from overwork.

His manual of Moslem law according to the Shafi'ite school has been edited with French translation by van den Bergh, 2 vols., Batavia (1882-1884), and published at Cairo (1888). The Tahdhib ul-Asma'i has been edited as the Biographical Dictionary of Illustrious Men chiefly at the Beginning of Islam by F Wüstenfeld (Göttingen, 1842-1847).

The Taqrib tea Taisir, an introduction to the study of tradition, was published at Cairo, 1890, with Suyuti's commentary. It has been in part translated into French by M. Marcais in the Journal asiatique, series ix., vols. 16-18 (1900-1901).

Nawawi's collection of the forty (actually forty-two) chief traditions has been frequently published with commentaries in Cairo. For other works see C Brockelmann's Gesch. der arabischen Litteratur, vol. i. (Weimar, 1898), pp. 395-397.

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