Ibn al-Khatib

Lisan al-Din Ibn al-Khatib (16 November 1313 – 1374) was the great polymath of Nasrid Granada: poet, historian, physician, philosopher and, for much of his life, vizier. Born at Loja, he lost his father and brother at the Battle of Río Salado in 1340, then served his teacher Ibn al-Jayyab, Yusuf I's vizier, succeeding him when he died of plague.

The coup of 1359 put him in prison; the Marinid sultan secured his release, and he spent three years in Moroccan exile before returning in 1362 when Muhammad regained the throne. His verses decorate the Alhambra, and his history of Granada, al-Ihata, was written in 1369.

In 1371, with Muhammad V grown wary of him and the Grand Qadi al-Nubahi branding his Sufi writings heretical, he left Granada again. Tried for heresy at Fes, he was strangled in 1374, and his enemies had his body dug up and burned.