al-Yaʿqūbī

Gordon et al (2018:3) provides the following biographical information:

al-Ya‘qubi was of notable Iraqi birth and education, and that he spent much of his professional life in the employment of provincial governing families of the late third/ninth-century ‘Abbasid empire. His own statements indicate that he worked in Armenia, perhaps at an early point in his career, and that he took up subsequently with the Tahirid family in the Iranian province of Khurasan. We have no direct evidence, but it seems that [al-Yaqubi] then made his way to Egypt following the fall of the Tahirids around 258/872. There he lent his skills to the administration of the Tūlūnid state (254—292/868—905), which was among the first autonomous regional dynasties to challenge the ‘Abbasid state, founded roughly a century earlier.

Gordon et al (2018:4) describes History of Ibn Wāḍiḥ (aka Ta’rikh al-Yaqubi) as follows:

The Ta’rikh (History)

The text, of which we possess two manuscripts, is a universal chronicle consisting of two parts: a pre-Islamic section covering a variety of empires and peoples that is primarily sequential in organization, and an Islamic-era section that tracks the history of the Islamic polity from the prophet Muhammad's day until roughly 259/872-873.

... The second half of the History contains a concise narrative of Islamic and Middle Eastern history, beginning with a biography of the Prophet Muhammad and proceeding with his immediate successors (the so-called ‘Rashidun’ caliphs, a designation that does not occur, however, anywhere in these texts), followed by the Umayyad and ‘Abbasid rulers to about 259/873. Throughout, al- Ya'qübi follows a fairly consistent scheme: he begins with each ruler's accession and (often) the horoscope for the date of accession, then provides a brief nar- rative of the major events of his reign; the circumstances of the caliph’s death; a list of the major officials and religious scholars active during his reign; and a brief assessment of his character and male progeny. Ibn Wadih’s employment of horoscopes ought not be viewed as a bow to superstition; instead, it reflects — and, perhaps, champions— the broad cultural tastes of his still Late Antique readership.

Gordon et al (2018:3) also discussed Al-Ya‘qubi’s religious views

Al-Ya‘qubi’s religious views were clearly Shi'ite, but they seem to conform neither to the Imami Shiite tradition that would prevail later, nor to what would become the Zaydi Shrite tradition. ... Writing as he did before ‘classical’ Shi‘ism crystallized, al-Ya‘qubi held religious views that later Muslims likely found difficult to categorize.