Badi al-Zaman al-Hamadhani

Ahmad ibn al-Husayn, known by the honorific title Badi al-Zaman ("the Wonder of the Age"), was an Arabic-language writer of Persian background, remembered above all for the maqama (plural maqamat) — a short tale told in saj (ornate rhymed prose) that follows an eloquent, trickster-like wanderer through scenes of social satire. He is traditionally credited with founding the genre, which was later carried to its high point by al-Hariri of Basra.

He was born in Hamadan, in western Iran, in 358 AH (969 CE). Reports place him at Rayy around 380/990, where tradition says he met the philologist Ibn Faris, and then at Jurjan (Gorgan), where he is said to have begun composing his maqamat. He won wide fame around 382-383/992 in Nishapur after a celebrated public contest of eloquence with the established man of letters Abu Bakr al-Khwarizmi. He travelled across Khurasan and Sistan — received at Zaranj by the Saffarid ruler Khalaf ibn Ahmad — before settling at Herat (in the district of Bushanj), where he married into a notable family and enjoyed the protection of court figures connected to the Ghaznavid ruler Mahmud.

About 52 of his maqamat survive, alongside a collection of letters; later biographers credit him with many more now lost. He died at Herat in 398 AH (1007-08 CE), about forty years old. Later biographers such as Ibn Khallikan and al-Safadi preserve two differing accounts of his death — one by poisoning, one a dramatic tale of premature burial — which are reported tradition rather than established fact.