Abu l’Fath

Abu l'Fath, a Samaritan, wrote Kitab al-Ta'rikh in 1355 CE and cited sources (Crown, 1989:221). The document exists in multiple differing manuscripts (Karcz, 2004). Karcz (2004:784) described Abu l'Fath's texts as follows:

The 14th century chronicle of Abu l’Fath [] exists in many manuscript versions and «was plagiarized, summarized, abstracted, paraphrased and edited for several other chronicles which were then presented as different old chronicles» (Stenhouse, 1989). The chronicle has a shorter original version which brings the text up to the rise of Mohammed and an expanded version to bring it more up to date. Abu l’Fath wrote the chronicle in 1355, following a discussion he had with the High Priest in 1352 lamenting the virtual absence of materials on history of the Samaritans (Payne-Smith, 1863; Vilmar,1865; Stenhouse, 1981). He used some extinct (or not found) Samaritan sources and is thought to have used extensively materials then available in Damascus and Gaza. Thus it is not clear whether the [excerpt] of an earthquake [Sabbatical Year Quake(s)] is based on primary notes.