[17] “The Pulse of Asia,” Houghton, Mifflin & Co., New York, 1907, p. 325.
[18] See however Gardner’s Al-Ghazali in the “Islam Series” (pp. 1-3) where we have this note: “The district of Tus contained four towns, Radkan, Tabaran, Bazdghur, and Nawqan, (Yaqut gives the spelling as Nuqan) and more than 1,000 villages.” (See Yaqut, quoting Misʾar bin Mukhalhil, vol. vi, p. 7. Ibn Khallikan, vol. i, p. 29. Jackson, From Constantinople to the Home of Omar Khayyam, p. 267, 284 ff.) Of these four towns, Tabaran was the capital, while Nawqan was the most populous. It was outside of Nawqan that ʿAli bin Musa ar-Rida and Haroun Ar-Rashid were buried. Thus, the present Mashad represents the old Nawqan, and must cover some at least of the site of that city; while the ruins now known as Tus represent the old city of Tabaran, which, having been the capital of the district, was commonly called by the name of the district. It was outside Tabaran that Al-Ghazali and Firdausi were buried. It is a mistake to regard Tus as having been a metropolis containing four boroughs. That there ever existed a city of Tus stretching thirty-five miles, from Mashad to Radkan, is incredible. As-Samʾani, in the Kitabu’l-Ansab, says that Tus contained two towns and over one thousand villages.
[19] “The Glory of the Shiah World,” London, 1910. In this book we have an interesting picture of Mashad and Tus as they are to-day.
[20] “Kashf al-Mahjub,” pp. 173-174.
[21] “Hayat-ul-Hayawan,” by Damiri.
[22] Referred to in his “Life of Al-Ghazzali.”
[23] Ibn Khallikan (Vol. I, p. 29, Cairo, 1310) leaves little doubt that Samaʾani spells it with one “z,” Ghazali. So also is the spelling of German Orientalists including Brockelmann. He writes (Vol. I, p. 419) “So, als Nisbe zu Gazala, einem kleinen Orte bei Tus, nach dem ausdrücklichen Zeugnis des Samʾanis, jenes ausgezeichneten Kenners iranischer Namen, (s. o. p. 330) b. j. Hall, nr. 37; die von Gosche 1, 1, nr. 3 auf Grund später, persischer Quellen verteidigte Schreibung ‘Gazzali’ verdankt offenbar einer Volksetymologie ihr Dasein in Anlehnung an die nach al Samʾani in Hwarizm gebräuchlichen Nisben, wie al Qassari für al Qassar. Sujuti den Gosche citiert bestätigt keineswegs seine auffassung, sondern gibt seine Quelle als Samʾani genau wieder.” Clement Huart (“History of Arabic Literature,” p. 265) gives the preference to Ghazali; so do the French Orientalists in the Revue du Monde Mussulman, Goldziher in his latest work Vorlesungen über den Islam (1910), and the well-known Dutch Arabist, Snouck Hurgronje. Yet in spite of all this those who prefer “Ghazzali” may appeal to the highest Moslem authority, namely, Mohammed the Prophet who is said to have declared to some one in a dream that this was the correct spelling. (See “Murtadha,” Vol. I, p. 18.) I have a fatwa from the Sheikhs of Al-Azhar, Cairo, however, stating that the true spelling is now agreed on by Moslems as Ghazali with one middle radical.
[24] Macdonald.
[25] From the Biography given at the end of Miskat-ul-Anwar, Cairo edition (1322).
[26] “The Confessions of Al-Ghazali,” trans. by Claud Field, London, 1909.