Jawad Ali
Iraqi historian and academic (1907–1987)
Jawad Ali (1907–1987) was an Iraqi historian and academic who specialized in the history of both Islam and the Arabs. He is best known for his work al-Mufassal fi Tarikh al-Arab Qabl al-Islam (The comprehensive History of the Arabs before Islam), which is one of the most referenced works on pre-Islamic Arabia. Jawad Ali also had a doctorate from the University of Hamburg in 1939, and worked at the History department in the University of Baghdad starting from 1950.
Biography
Jawad Ali was born in a town located in the Kadhimiya district of Baghdad, Iraq. After completing most of his studies in his homeland, he migrated to Germany where he would receive a doctorate from the University of Hamburg in 1939. After his return from Germany, he married an Iraqi woman and had three sons from this marriage, all of whom would become influential academics in future. With his family, he went on travels to Massachusetts and also the United Kingdom, where he also visited the institutes in those places as a visiting professor. In 1950, he was a professor at the History department of the University of Baghdad.
Death
In his older years, a terminal illness plagued him, and eventually he died from it at the age of 80 on the 26th of September in the year 1987.
Works
Jawad Ali mainly specialized in Islamic history, as well as the history of the Arabs in general.
The public source identifies “Jawad Ali” as iraqi historian and academic (1907–1987). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Jawad, Iraqi and historian.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6759210. VIAF identifies the subject as 54470716. The Library of Congress control number is n85194698. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1907, 1987, 1939 and 1950.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jawad Ali” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.