Ahmad al-Wansharisi

Ahmad ibn Yahya al-Wansharisi (born c. 1430, died 1508) was a jurist of the Maliki school — one of the four main Sunni schools of Islamic law — who became the chief mufti (issuer of legal opinions) of Fez, in present-day Morocco. By tradition he was born into a Berber family in the Wansharis (Ouarsenis) mountains of what is now Algeria, and his family moved while he was a child to Tlemcen, then a major Zayyanid capital, where he studied the Qur'an, Arabic, and Maliki law. He lived and taught in Tlemcen for many years.

Reports hold that in 1469 he ran afoul of the ruling sultan, who had his house plundered, and he fled to Fez. There the scholarly community welcomed him; he taught Maliki law and rose to become the city's leading mufti.

He is remembered above all for al-Mi'yar al-Mu'rib, a vast multi-volume compilation of fatwas from across the medieval Maghreb and Muslim Spain (al-Andalus) — today a prime source for historians of Andalusi and North African society. He also issued an influential, much-debated opinion (the Asna al-matajir) arguing that Muslims living under Christian rule in reconquered Spain were obliged to emigrate to Muslim lands. He died in Fez in 1508 and was buried there. Some early dates rest on traditional estimates rather than firm records.