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The Night Phantom on the Rooftops and the Tigris Flood of 337

وهم السطوح الليلي وفيضان دجلة سنة ٣٣٧

c. 948 CE · 337 AH

Baghdad

In 337 Baghdadis panicked by night for days at an animal imagined on the rooftops — now a wolf, now something else — beginning in Suq al-Thalatha' and spreading to both sides; and on Monday two nights before Ramadan's end the Tigris crested at twenty-one and a third cubits, drowning estates and nearly the whole east bank 1.

Depth

At a glance

Era
The Early Abbasid Caliphate
Region
Levant & Iraq
Review
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In time

930940950960 c.
Abbasid Fragmentation · The Buyid, Fatimid and Seljuk Era

In space

Baghdad

Map: Natural Earth, public domain · places and route from the graph

Overview

Among the events of 337 that Ibn al-Jawzi records in the Muntazam: the appearance of the night "phantom" and the floods of waters over Baghdad and its districts — part of that year's catalogue of calamities and nightly terrors 2.

Connections

Explore the connections

Occurred at
Baghdad

People and things also explored

The Nizamiyya Madrasa of Baghdad· Bayt al-Hikma — the House of Wisdom· The 'Adudi Bimaristan· al-Bimaristan al-Muqtadiri· Bimaristan al-Sayyida· Dar al-'Ilm of Baghdad (Sabur's library)· The Jami' al-Qati'a of Baghdad· The mosque of Qati'at Umm Ja'far

Sources

  1. al-Muntazam fi Tarikh al-Muluk wa'l-Umam — Ibn al-Jawzi , p. 649
  2. al-Muntazam fi Tarikh al-Muluk wa'l-Umam — Ibn al-Jawzi
Cite this page

islam.museum contributors. “The Night Phantom on the Rooftops and the Tigris Flood of 337”. islam.museum, https://islam.museum/en/event/night-phantom-and-flood-337/. CC BY-SA 4.0. Last updated 2026-10-22.

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Time

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The Nizamiyya Madrasa of Baghdad

The Nizamiyya of Baghdad, first and most famous of the madrasas founded by the vizier Nizam al-Mulk al-Tusi: building began in 457 and sisters rose at Nishapur, Isfahan, Herat, Basra, Mosul and Amid; the Imam al-Haramayn al-Juwayni then Abu Ishaq al-Shirazi taught in it, and it mothered the Sunni institutional model that the later madrasas of Baghdad followed — the caliphs prayed there and Nizam al-Mulk himself visited to inspect its library.