Musa bin 'Uqba

Musa ibn Uqba al-Asadi al-Qurashi was a Medinan Tabi'i scholar best known for his pioneering work in Islamic historical writing, particularly his early Sira (biography of the Prophet ﷺ) which Imam Malik praised as 'the most authentic of the Siras.' He was a freed slave of the household of al-Zubayr ibn al-Awwam and grew up in close proximity to the scholarly circles of Medina, narrating from major Tabi'in including Nafi', Urwa ibn al-Zubayr, and the scholars of Medina's scholarly elite. Imam Malik considered his transmission of the prophetic biography to be the most reliable available and expressed that view publicly. As a hadith narrator, he is considered trustworthy by the major hadith critics. He narrated reports on prayer, the Prophet's ﷺ expeditions, and various aspects of Islamic practice. His narrations appear in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim. He also composed one of the earliest surviving written accounts of the Prophet's ﷺ military expeditions (maghazi), making him not only a hadith narrator but a foundational figure in the discipline of Islamic historical writing. He died around 141 AH.