Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn Yasar was born in Medina around 704 CE into a family engaged in hadith and battle-narrative studies, and he grew up collecting reports about the Prophet's life from the generation after the Companions.
He traveled to Egypt and Iraq gathering narrations before settling in Baghdad, where he compiled his 'al-Maghazi wa'l-Sirah', the first comprehensive, chronologically arranged biography of the Prophet, weaving together reports, poetry, and genealogy.
Legacy
Ibn Ishaq's original text did not survive intact, but his student Ibn Hisham refined and abridged it into what became known as the 'Sira of Ibn Hisham'. Ibn Ishaq's work remains the foundational source on which all later biographies of the Prophet were built.
