Ibn Battuta Explained

Ibn Battuta (; 24 February 13041368/1369), was a Maghrebi traveller, explorer and scholar. Over a period of thirty years from 1325 to 1354, Ibn Battuta visited much of Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and the Iberian Peninsula. Near the end of his life, he dictated an account of his journeys, titled A Gift to Those Who Contemplate the Wonders of Cities and the Marvels of Travelling, but commonly known as The Rihla.

Ibn Battuta travelled more than any other explorer in pre-modern history, totalling around, surpassing Zheng He with about and Marco Polo with .^{[3] [4]}

Name

"Ibn Battuta" is a patronymic, literally meaning 'son of the duckling'.^[5] His most common full name is given as Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Battuta.^[6] In his travelogue, The Rihla, he gives his full name as "Shams al-Din Abu’Abdallah Muhammad ibn’Abdallah ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn Yusuf Lawati al-Tanji ibn Battuta".^{[7] [8] [9]}

Early life

All that is known about Ibn Battuta's life comes from the autobiographical information included in the account of his travels, which records that he was of Berber descent, born into a family of Islamic legal scholars (known as qadis in the Muslim traditions of Morocco) in Tangier on 24 February 1304, during the reign of the Marinid dynasty. His family belonged to a Berber tribe known as the Lawata. As a young man, he would have studied at a Sunni Maliki school, the dominant form of education in North Africa at that time. Maliki Muslims requested that Ibn Battuta serve as their religious judge, as he was from an area where it was practised.^[10]

Journeys

Itinerary, 1325–1332

First pilgrimage

On 2 Rajab 725 AH (14 June 1325 AD), Ibn Battuta set off from his home town at the age of 21 on a hajj (pilgrimage) to Mecca, a journey that would ordinarily take sixteen months. He was eager to learn more about far-away lands and craved adventure. He would not return to Morocco again for 24 years.

He travelled to Mecca overland, following the North African coast across the sultanates of Abd al-Wadid and Hafsid. The route took him through Tlemcen, Béjaïa, and then Tunis, where he stayed for two months. For safety, Ibn Battuta usually joined a caravan to reduce the risk of being robbed. He took a bride in the town of Sfax,^[11]

Notes and References

1. Norris . H. T. . 1959 . Ibn Baṭṭūṭah's Andalusian Journey . The Geographical Journal . 125 . 2 . 185–196 . 1790500 . 0016-7398.
2. Web site: Romy . Roynard . 22 November 2018 . Sur les traces d'Ibn Battuta: le Maroc . 7 December 2022 . National Geographic . fr . 7 December 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20221207014923/https://www.nationalgeographic.fr/ibn-battuta/2018/11/sur-les-traces-dibn-battuta-le-maroc . live.
3. Book: Parker, John . The World Book Encyclopedia . 15 . 2004 . Marco Polo . Illustrated . World Book . 978-0-7166-0104-3 . John Parker (author) . World Book Encyclopedia.
4. Book: Nehru, Jawaharlal . Glimpses of World History . Glimpses of World History . Oxford University Press . 1989 . 978-0-19-561323-0 . 752 . Jawaharlal Nehru. After outlining the extensive route of Ibn Battuta's Journey, Nehru notes: "This is a record of travel which is rare enough today with our many conveniences. ... In any event, Ibn Battuta must be amongst the great travelers of all time."
5. Book: Gearon, Eamonn . The Sahara: A Cultural History . 2011 . Oxford University Press . 978-0-19-986195-8.
6. Web site: Ibn Battuta . 1 November 2020 . 24 October 2020 . https://web.archive.org/web/20201024055136/https://www.famousscientists.org/ibn-battuta/ . live.
7. Encyclopedia: Mark . Joshua J. . Ibn Battuta . 7 February 2023 . World History Encyclopedia . 7 February 2023 . https://web.archive.org/web/20230207020714/https://www.worldhistory.org/Ibn_Battuta/ . live. His full name, as given in the Rihla, was Shams al-Din Abu’Abdallah Muhammad ibn’Abdallah ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn Yusuf al-Lawati al-Tanji ibn Battuta and all that is known of his family comes from the Rihla which records references to his education and provides his lineage.
8. Encyclopedia: Ibn Battuta (1304–1368) . Encyclopedia.com . 1 November 2020 . 25 November 2020 . https://web.archive.org/web/20201125143000/https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/ibn-battuta-1304-1368 . live.
9. Encyclopedia: Ibn Battuta . Encyclopædia Britannica . 7 February 2023 . 9 November 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20221109083838/https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ibn-Battuta . live . Ibn Battuta, also spelled Ibn Baṭṭūṭah, in full Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Lawātī al-Ṭanjī ibn Baṭṭūṭah, (born February 24, 1304, Tangier, Morocco—died 1368/69 or 1377, Morocco), the greatest medieval Muslim traveler and the author of one of the most famous travel books, the Riḥlah (Travels)..
10. Book: Goitein, Shelomo Dov . A Mediterranean Society . University of California Press . 1967 . I: Economic Foundations . 67 . Shelomo Dov Goitein.
11. Web site: Ibn Battuta: Travels in Asia and Africa 1325–1354 . live . https://web.archive.org/web/20170820121438/http://www.indiana.edu/~dmdhist/ibnbattuta.htm . 20 August 2017 . 6 December 2017 . Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis . Indiana University.