Al-Dhuhli
A family name (nisba) to Dhuhl within Bakr ibn Wāʾil — a name the Bakr genealogy carries twice, an elder Dhuhl and a younger, which the genealogists take care to keep apart.
- Type
- Tribal nisba
- Attributed to
- Dhuhl of Bakr ibn Wāʾil
- Root
- dh-h-l (dhuhūl, forgetting, being turned away)
- Note
- Bakr carries the name twice — an elder Dhuhl and a younger
Overview
Al-Dhuhli (al-Dhuhlī) is attributed to Dhuhl within Bakr ibn Wāʾil. Dhuhūl in Lisān al-ʿArab is being turned away from a thing and forgetting it — a name of the kind Arabic takes from an incident rather than from a virtue.
Names easily confused
The confusion in this name lies inside the genealogy itself. Bakr carries Dhuhl at two different points: an elder Dhuhl set high in the chain, and a younger Dhuhl reckoned to Shaybān below him. Both yield al-Dhuhlī, and Ibn Ḥazm and al-Qalqashandī are at pains to say which is meant, because generations stand between them and the men attached to one are not the men attached to the other. A nisba given here without the father is incomplete in a way it is not for most names. Outside Bakr, Dhuhl occurs as an ordinary personal name as well, and a family named from such an ancestor bears the identical form.
Bearing the name
A tribal nisba records what a family is called, not who its ancestors were. It may follow descent (ṣarīḥ), alliance (ḥilf) or clientage (walāʾ), and only a family's own documented record tells those apart.
Sources
- ابن حزم الأندلسي، جمهرة أنساب العرب، 456هـ — بكر بن وائل — ذهل الأعلى وذهل الأدنى؛ يُراجَع ويُوثَّق قبل إثبات التفاصيل
- القلقشندي، نهاية الأرب في معرفة أنساب العرب، 821هـ — في ذكر بطون بكر بن وائل والتمييز بين الذهلين
- ابن منظور، لسان العرب، 711هـ — مادة: ذهل
This page is an educational, historical reference compiled from published sources. It is not an authority on lineage. Where sources differ, we report the difference without taking a position. Corrections are welcome via our contact page.
Last reviewed: 2026-09-07