Abu Bakr Bin Yahya Al-Suli

Abu Bakr Bin Yahya Al-Suli

Abu Bakr Muhammad bin Yahya al-Suli (c. 880 – 946) was a nadim (boon companion) of successive Abbasid caliphs. He was noted for his poetry and scholarship and wrote a chronicle called Akhbar al-Radi wa'l-Muttaqi, detailing the reigns of the caliphs al-Radi and al-Muttaqi. He was a legendary shatranj (an ancestor of chess) player, still remembered to this day.

Upon the death of al-Radi in 940, al-Suli fell into disfavour with the new ruler due to his sympathies towards Shi'a Islam and as a result had to go into exile at Basra, where he spent the rest of his life in poverty. Al-Suli's great-grandfather was the Turkish prince Sul-takin and his uncle the poet Ibrahim ibn al-'Abbas as-Suli.