Maliki School of Jurisprudence

Timeline

1. c. 750–795Medina · HejazMalik ibn Anas taught jurisprudence in Medina and compiled the Muwatta, establishing a method of adjudication combining hadith, Medinan practice, and consensus, opposing over-reliance on personal opinion and forming a distinctive Sunni path emphasizing local scholarly tradition.
2. 801–901Córdoba · al-AndalusDuring the Umayyad period in al-Andalus, the Maliki school entered Iberia with scholars and judges, establishing teaching traditions in places like Córdoba, gradually displacing other local legal tendencies and becoming the mainstream jurisprudence applied in the court and qadi courts.
3. 1001–1101Marrakesh · MoroccoThe Almoravid and Almohad dynasties established Maliki jurisprudence as official doctrine, uniformly applied in qadi courts across North Africa; jurists such as Ibn Rushd (the elder) participated in compiling adjudication summaries, deeply binding the school to political power.
4. 1211–1220Islamic western Mediterranean world · al-AndalusIn the early 13th century, the Maliki school remained the standard jurisprudence of qadi courts and religious schools in Islamic territories of the western Mediterranean. Though the Almohad Empire was in decline, its judicial system still adjudicated civil and criminal cases according to Maliki summaries, coexisting with the legal pluralism under the Christian Reconquista.