The Travels of Ibn Battuta,

AD 1325–1354
Volume IV

Edited by
H.A.R. GIBB AnD C.F. BECkInGHAm
 WORKS ISSUED BY
THE HAKLUYT SOCIETY

THE TRAVELS OF UN
A.D.
VOL. IV

SECOND
NO, 178
 HAKLUYT SOCIETY
COUNCIL AND OFFICERS, 1994-95

PRESIDENT
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Chinese conjurors and acrobats. From V.duwardMeltons . . 7.ee- en Land-Reizen, Amsterdam, 1681. See p. 904.
By courtesy of the British Library1
 THE TRAVELS OF
IBN BATTUTA
A.D. 1325-1354
Translated with revisions and notes
from the Arabic text edited by
C. OEF.REM.ERY and B, R. SANGUINETTI

by
H. A. R, GIBB

VOL. IV

The translation completed with annotations

by
C. F, BECKINGHAM

THE HAKLUYT
LONDON
1994
 Hakluyt Society 1994
urn 0904180 37 9
KBN 0072 93%

Typeset by Wtvettey Typesetters, Norwich

Printed in Oie»t Bntain at
the Univenicy Press, Cambridge

SERIES EDITORS
W. r. ftYAN ittd .SARAH TVACKE

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Libmry

Published by che Hakluyt Society

c/o The Map Library
British Library, Great Russell Street
London wow ADO
 CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS .. .. ..

FOREWORD TO VOLUME FOUR .. .. .. .. ix

CHAPTERXV. FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA .. .. 773

Sultan Muhammad's gift to the king of China, 773;
members of the embassy, 774; the embassy leaves
Dihll, 775; Ibn Battuta taken prisoner, 777; his escape,
778; he meets a saint, 781; Shaikh Muhammad the
Naked, 783; Galyur, 787; yogis, 788; Dawlat Abad,
793; the Marhatas, 796.
CHAPTERXVI. SOUTH INDIA .. .. .. .. 797
Kinbaya, 797; Ibn Battuta embarks at Qandahar (Gan-
dhar), 799; Quqa, 800; Sandabur, 801; a Muslim yogi,
801; Hinawr, 802; Mulaibar, 805; Abu Sarur, 807;
Fakanur, 808; Manjarur, 808; Hill, 809; Jurfattan, 810;
Budfattan, 811; Fandarayna, Qaliqut, 812; Chinese
ships, 813; the fleet wrecked, 815; Ibn Baptuta travels
by inland waterways to Kawlam, 816; he returns to
Hinawr, 818; the Muslims conquer Sandabur, 819; the
Hindus besiege Sandabur and Ibn Battuta returns to
Qaliqup, 821.
CHAPTERXVII. THE MALDIVES .. .. .. .. 822
Ibn Bapputa arrives in the Maldives, 822; the inhabi-
tants, their diet, customs, houses, currency and
womenfolk, 823; their conversion to Islam, 829; Sul-
tana Khadlja, 831; Maldivian officials, 833; Ibn Battuta
arrives in Kannalus and proceeds to the capital on
Mahal, 833; his reception by the Wazlr Jamal al-Dln,
834; he tries to leave the Maldives, 837; the festival at
the end of Ramadan, 839; Ibn Battuta marries the
Sultana's mother-in-law and becomes the qa^I, 840; he
quarrels with another of the Wazlrs, 841; he plots to go
to Coromandel and bring troops to invade the islands,
844; he goes to the island of Muluk and leaves the
Maldives, 845.
CHAPTER XVIII. CEYLON .. .. .. 847
Ibn Bappupa arrives in Ceylon and is received by the
ruler of Bappala, 847; he leaves for Adam's Peak, 849;
Kunakar and the rubies found there, 850; monkeys,
851; leeches, 852; Adam's Peak, 853; Dinawar, 855;
Qall and Kalanbu, 856.
CHAPTER XIX. COROMANDEL, MALABAR AND THE
MALDIVES.. .. .. .. •• •• •• 857
Ibn Bappupa is wrecked on the Coromandel coast, 857;
he meets the Sultan and plans the invasion of the
Maldives, 858; the Sultan's cruelty, 860; defeat of the
Hindus, 861; death of the Sultan, 863; Ibn Bappupa
abandons the planned invasion, leaves for Hinawr,
but is plundered of all his possessions by pirates, 865;
he returns to the Maldives, 865.
CHAPTER XX. BENGAL AND ASSAM .. .. .. 867
Ibn Bappupa sails to Bengal and finds the cost of living
low, 867; Sudkawan and the Sultan of Bengal, 868;
Shaikh Jalal al-Dm and his miracles, 870; Sunarkawan
and Ibn Bappupa's departure from Bengal, 873.
CHAPTER XXI. SOUTH-EAST ASIA .. .. .. 874
The Barahnakar, 874; Ibn Bappupa arrives in al-Jawa
(Sumatra), 876; court ceremonial, 877; Ibn Bappupa
sails to Mul Jawa Qava), 880; incense, camphor, aloes
and cloves, 881; the Sultan of Mul Jawa and men who
cut their throats for love of him, 863; Ibn Bappupa
crosses the Sluggish Sea to TawalisI, 884; Kailukarl
and the princess Urduja, 885; women soldiers, 887.
CHAPTER XXII. CHINA .. .. .. .. .. 888
Chinese produce, pottery and huge fowls, 888; Chinese
customs, 889; paper money, 890; coal and kaolin, 891;
Chinese skill in portraiture, 891; their treatment of
merchants, 892; Zaitun, 894; Sin Kalan, 896; a strange
ascetic, 897; Qanjanfu, where Ibn Bappupa meets a man
from Ceuta, 899; al-Khansa, 900; entertainment offer-
ed by a high official, 902; a Persian song and a conjuror,
903; Ibn Bappupa enters Khita, 905; Khan Baliq and the
Qan's palace, 906; the Qan killed fighting his rebel-
lious uncle, 907; funeral of the Qan, 908.
CHAPTER XXIII. FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO .. .. 911
Ibn Bappupa returns to Zaitun, leaves China and en-
counters the rukhkh, 911; he reaches al-Jawa and sees
vi
 CONTENTS

the wedding of the Sultan's son, 912; he sails to

Kaulam, Qaliqup, £afar, the coast of'Oman and Hur-
muz, 913; he travels by land through Persia to al-
Basra, Baghdad, and Damascus, 914; an execution for
blasphemy, 918; the Black Death, 918; Ibn Bappupa
travels to Jerusalem and Cairo, 918; he performs the
pilgrimage and returns to Jerusalem and Cairo, then
decides to return to Morocco, 921; Tunis, 922; he
sails in a Catalan ship which calls at Sardinia, 924; he
lands at Tanas and travels to Tilimsan and Fez, 924;
eulogy of Morocco and its Sultan, 925.
CHAPTER XXIV. SPAIN .. .. .. .. .. 934
Ibn Batputa sails from Ceuta to Gibraltar, 934; the
concern of Sultan Abu'1 Hasan for Gibraltar, 935; a
poem in its praise, 937; Ronda and Marbella, 938; a
Christian raid on the coast, 939; Malaga and Granada,
940; Ibn Juzayy meets Ibn Bappupa, 943; Ibn BappQpa
returns to Morocco and goes to Marrakush, 944.
CHAPTER XXV. THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS .. 946
Ibn Bappupa bids farewell to the Sultan of Morocco and
travels to Sijilmasa and Taghaza, 946; he crosses the
desert, 947; he reaches Iwalatan, 950; customs of the
Massufa, 951; trees, fruits and vegetables in Malli,
952; the course of the Nile, 954; he arrives at the
capital of Malli, 955; the audience of the Sultan of
MallT, 958; ceremonies on religious festivals, 961;
judgments of the Sultan, 962; his quarrel with his
senior wife, 963; good and bad qualities of the Blacks,
965; Ibn Bappupa leaves Malli and sees a hippopota-
mus, 966; cannibalism, 968; Tunbuktu, 969; Kaukau,
971; Takadda 973; the Sultan of Morocco orders Ibn
Bappupa to return, 975; he reaches Fez, 977.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 979

VI1
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Chinese conjurors and acrobats. From Eduwara'Meltons . , ,

Zm- m LanJ-Rmm, Amsterdam, 1681
between pages 882 and 883
I, A visiting an From Bundi,
II. A white elephant. From Qazwlnl, *A/a*ii? ai*mafeMuqat.
IIL A gigantic bird carries off a woman. From Qazwfnl^ *
al-makhluqdt.
IV. A black king. From TopkapI Saray Muzesi.

vm
 FOREWORD TO VOLUME FOUR

T
his volume completes the translation of Ibn Bappupa's
travels. A fifth volume will contain further editorial
matter and the index to the entire work.
The translation of the narrative of Ibn Bappupa's travels has
taken more than twice as long as the travels themselves. It was
in 1922 that H. A. R. Gibb, then Lecturer in Arabic at the
School of Oriental Studies, University of London, proposed to
the Hakluyt Society that he should prepare what would be the
first, complete, annotated English translation of the book
usually known as the Rihla. His intention was to publish it in
four volumes, corresponding to those of the edition and paral-
lel French translation by G. Defremery and B. R. Sanguinetti
(1874 9), of which he thought highly. Gibb's life was busy
and his career distinguished. He became Professor of Arabic at
London, Oxford and Harvard in succession, and was knighted
for his services in 1954. It is not surprising that it was not till
1958 that the first volume was published. Volume II followed
in 1962, volume HI in 1971, shortly after Gibb had died, after
having suffered severe strokes which had caused him to resign
from his chair. In the meantime he had decided that a fifth
volume would be desirable, which would include an essay on
the chronology of the journeys, additional notes incorporating
comments by reviewers of the volumes already printed, and
an index. He had also published a volume of selections with
annotations in the Broadway Travellers series (1929).
When he returned to England from Harvard he was a very
sick man, unable to utter more than a sentence or two without
being exhausted. It is evidence of great courage and deter-
mination, as well as impressive scholarship, that he completed
volume III under such difficulties. I gave him some help with
reading the proofs and preparing the maps. About six months
before he died he proposed that I should take over the project
IX
 FOREWORD TO VOLUME FOUR

from him. I was naturally flattered, but at first felt obliged to

refuse; I had many other commitments, among them an under-
taking to annotate D. M. Lockhart's translation of the Itinerdrio
of Jeronimo Lobo for this Society. Gibb, however, was press-
ing. I suggested that I should seek a collaborator. He was, I now
think rightly, opposed to this; the scope for disagreement
would have been too vast. Eventually, with much hesitation,
I agreed to do as he wished, though not before I had warned
him and the Council of the Society that it would be some years
before I could give much attention to Ibn Bappupa. I had not
expected how many these years would be. Even after my
retirement from the University of London I incurred further
inescapable obligations. For the unconscionable delay in pro-
ducing this volume I apologize to the members.
When he handed over his work to me in 1971 Gibb had
done nothing to annotate the remaining portion of the narra-
tive, but he had translated as far as p. 191 of the French
edition. The earlier part of this, up to p. 61, he had revised
and retyped. It would be an impertinence for me to revise his
translation, but I have found that, no doubt as a consequence
of his illness, he sometimes omitted a word or phrase, and
occasionally a whole sentence. Also, and no doubt for the
same reason, he might change the order of items in a list of,
for instance, presents or commodities. Again, especially in the
part of his translation which he had not retyped, he at times
used different equivalents for the same word in the text when
the meaning was obviously the same. These I have felt justi-
fied in rectifying. Otherwise I have tried to follow his practice
in the volumes already published, both from respect for him
and for the convenience of readers. I have continued to indi-
cate the page numbers of the Arabic text in the margin of the
translation, and have shown as precisely as is possible the
division between the pages by a vertical line. I have used the
same English phrases for stereotyped Arabic formulae and
have conformed to Gibb's usage with regard to a few familiar
place names, writing Alexandria, Cairo and Mecca, but DihlT,
which he preferred to Delhi.
The Hakluyt Society has published very few translations
from oriental languages, though there is ample suitable mater-
ial in Arabic, Turkish, Persian and Chinese, to mention no
 FOREWORD TO VOLUME FOUR

others. One difficulty is the scarcity of adequate critical

editions of the original texts. Books written in the Arabic
script also present problems with which editors of narratives
in European languages are not confronted. It is well known
that the script as usually written does not represent short
vowels and represents long vowels and diphthongs ambi-
guously. This can make the identification of non-Islamic
proper names problematical. Fortunately Ibn Bappupa when
using such toponyms usually spells out precisely which vowel
is to be read with each consonant. Occasionally ambiguity
results from the absence of upper case letters in this script.
Thus, was his rosary one from Zaila' in Somalia, or one
made of cowries (p. 802)? Again, were the horses drawn up
outside the Sultan's palace in Sumatra relays (nauba), or
Nubian (nuba) (p. 879)?
A translator may have to choose between the meaning of a
word in standard classical Arabic and its meaning in the
Moroccan dialect with which Ibn Bappupa must have been
familiar. For instance, the word dhfb means a wolf in literary
Arabic; in Morocco where, as in all Africa, there are no wolves,
it means a jackal. When it occurs in a passage relating to a
country like India where both animals are found, it may only
be possible to guess which is meant, or to explain the ambi-
guity in a note. Zoological names sometimes give rise to a
subtler difficulty, which readers should bear in mind. When a
twentieth-century observer names an animal or bird the cat-
egory to which he assigns it is genetic; he assumes that it is the
offspring of two creatures of the same species, and that if it has
offspring of its own, they too will be of that species. For Ibn
Bappupa and his contemporaries, in Europe as well as in Dar al-
Islam, the category was not genetic but descriptive, descrip-
tive above all of size, shape and colour. Phenomena like
melanism and albinism could be regarded as the unusual but
not inconceivable consequence of parents having borne off-
spring of a species other than their own.
Confusion can also arise from the loose use of titles and
terms indicative of rank in Arabic writings. Amir, for example,
basically someone in a position to give orders, may designate
the ruler of an independent state, the commander of an army,
the governor of a province, or a city, or even the foreman in
XI
 FOREWORD TO VOLUME IV

charge of a body of artisans, as on p. 902. Some titles, like

sultan and malik, may also be used as personal names.
Ibn Bappupa was a compulsive name-dropper; in his Fore-
word to volume I Gibb explained why he tried to identify at
least some of the persons mentioned. There are voluminous
biographical dictionaries in Arabic in which they may be
sought. However, they are generally listed under their ism,
the equivalent of the baptismal name of a Christian, which an
author may not record at all. It will be followed by a selection
of the names of his paternal ancestors and various epithets
derived from his birthplace, a town in which he lived or held
an important appointment, or from some personal peculiarity.
An editor's quarry may be very elusive.
It will be a long time before a definitive commentary on the
Rihla can be attempted. It must be remembered that a consid-
erable number of Arabic books, written in or before his time,
has still not been catalogued, let alone printed. Mosque librar-
ies and private collections in Morocco are believed to contain
rich collections of such works. Ibn Bappupa and Ibn Juzayy may
have seen some of them. When they become accessible we
may be able to identify many more of the gatfts, preachers and
jurists of whom he speaks. We may also find the sources from
which he took information which he presents as the result of
his own observation.

xn
 NOTE TO FOREWORD TO VOLUME IV

t is not surprising that Gibb's usage should have varied

I slightly during the long time that he was concerned with

the work. In volumes I and II he used standard English
forms for place-names like Tangier, Alexandria, Cairo, Beirut
and Damascus; in volume III he eschewed even Delhi and
Calicut for DihlT and Qaliqup. With regard to transliteration it
may be noted that, although he wrote ^^"consistently, he did
not use macrons or subscript dots in words like sultan, amir,
sharif, dinar and mithqal. He used both vizier and wazir,
though not in the same context. For the occasional quotations
in Persian and Turkish Ibn Bappupa's text employs only the
letters of the Arabic alphabet, and not the additional conson-
ants available for writing these languages, so that b is not
distinguished from p, j from ch, or k from g. In such instances
it was Gibb's practice to represent the Persian or Turkish
spelling.

xni
 ABBREVIATIONS
(See Bibliography for full references)

Brunschvig La Berberie orientate sous les Hafsides.

Dibaj Ibn Farfcun, Al-dtbdj al-mudhdhahab.
Dozy Dozy, R., Supplement aux dictionnaires arabes.
Durar Ibn Hajar al'Asqalanl, Al-duraral-kamina.
El Encyclopedia ofIslam
Ibn Battuta. Travels in Asia and Africa. Trans-
Gibb, Selections
lated and edited by H. A. R. Gibb.
Hobson-Jobson Yule, Henry, and Burnell, A. C., Hobson-
Jobson. New edition edited by William
Crooke.
Ihata Ibn al-Khapib, Al-ifidtafiakhbdrGharnata.
JRAS Journal ofthe Royal Asiatic Society.
Levi-Provengal Le Voyage d'lbn Battuta dans le royaume de
Granada.
Mahdi Husain The Rise and Fall ofMuhammad bin Tughluq.
Mauny, Textes Textes et documents relatifs a Fhistoire de FAfri-
que.
Mzik Die Reise des Ambers Ibn Batuta durch Indien
und China.
Nailal-ibtihdj Afcmad Baba, Nail al-ibtihdjfitairizal-dibdj.
Yule, Cathay Cathay and the Way Thither.

xiv
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

am grateful to the School of Oriental and African Studies,

I University of London, for granting me one term's leave of

absence which, combined with two adjoining vacations,
enabled me to visit briefly India, Sri Lanka and the Maldives.
I received much hospitality and kindness in these countries.
In particular I wish to record my gratitude to two friends who
took great trouble to facilitate my travels in Kerala and in Sri
Lanka respectively, Professor P. M. Jussay and Desubandu L.
A. Adithiya, ARIBA.
In annotating such a wide-ranging travel narrative as this, I
have naturally incurred obligations to numerous scholars,
many of them former colleagues and personal friends. I am
especially grateful to Dr James Bynon for advice on the mean-
ing of Berber and Moroccan Arabic words, to Dr David V.
Field, of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, for information
about aloes wood, to Professor Dr Herbert Franke for his
prompt answers to questions about Yuan China, to Professor].
D. Latham for his comments on a Hispano-Arabic poem, and
for replying to many queries about Al-Andalus, to Mr Robert
Nicholl for his knowledge of Brunei and the adjoining coun-
tries and seas, to Professor H. T. Norris for his knowledge of
the western Sahara, to MrC. H. B. Reynolds for his identifica-
tion of Sinhalese and especially of Maldivian terms, and to
Professor G. Rex Smith for his command of the sources for the
history of fourteenth-century Arabia. For guidance in choosing
Islamic paintings to illustrate the narrative I am grateful to Mr
B. W. Robinson.
I have drawn freely on the notes which Gibb provided in
the volume of selections from the narrative which he pub-
lished in 1929. Among other works which I have utilized two
deserve special mention, H. von Mzik's annotated German
translation of a large part of the contents of the present
xv
 AC K NOW L E DO M ENTS

volume, a model of thorough and painstaking scholarship, and

Ross Bunn's The Aabm/ttm of Ifin Bamta, an enlightening
study which sets the travels in the context of contemporary
events,
At a time when several important libraries are becoming
more difficult to use it is a pleasure to acknowledge the
competence, helpfulness and forbearance of the Librarian of
the Royal Asiatic Society, Mr M. J. Pollock.
Lastly, I have to thank my daughter, Miss Carolyn Becking-
ham, for bringing to my attention a number of inconsistencies,
obscurities and infelicities in my text.

XVI
 CHAPTER XV

From Dihli to Kinbaya

A ccount of the reason for the sending of the gift to China, of those
Zl who were sent with me and of the gift itself. The king of
JL A China had sent to the Sultan a hundred mamluks and
slave girls, five hundred pieces of velvet cloth, including a
hundred of those which are manufactured in the city of Zaitun
[Ch'iian-chou] and a hundred of those which are manufac-
tured in Khansa [Hangchou], five maunds of musk, five robes
adorned with jewels, five embroidered quivers, and five
swords, with a request that the Sultan would permit him to
rebuild the idol-temple which is near the aforesaid mountains
called Qarajil [Himalaya]. 1 It is in a place known as Samhal, |
to which the Chinese go on pilgrimage; the Muslim army in
India had captured it, laid it in ruins and sacked it. 2 The
Sultan, on receiving this gift, wrote to the king saying that the
request could not be granted by Islamic law, as permission to
build a temple in the territories of the Muslims was granted
only to those who paid a poll-tax; to which he added 'If thou
wilt pay thejizya we shall empower thee to build it. And peace
be on those who follow the True Guidance'. He requited his
present with an even richer one a hundred thoroughbred
horses saddled and bridled, a hundred male slaves, a hundred
Hindu singing- and dancing-girls, a hundred pieces ofbairami
cloth, which are made of cotton and are unequalled in beauty,
1 No reference to this embassy has yet been traced in either the Chinese or the
Indian records.
2 Yule (Cathay, IV, p. 18) identified this as Sambhal in Rohilkhand. Al-Samhal
has been mentioned by I. B. (Ill, p. 614) as the district which includes Badaun.
However, no Buddhist remains have been found there, and the religion was
probably extinct in that part of India by the fourteenth century. Besides, Sultan
Muhammad already controlled the area and on his Himalayan campaign marched
in another direction, towards Nagarkot. Sambhal can hardly be described as being
near the Himalayas.

773
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

each piece being worth a hundred dinars3 -a hundred lengths

3 of the silk fabrics called juzz, in which the silk material | of
each is dyed with four or five different colours 4 - four hundred
pieces of the fabrics known as $aldht* a hundred pieces of
shmn-baf* a hundred pieces of shdn-bdf, 1 five hundred pieces
of mir'iz woollens, 8 one hundred of them black and a hun-
dred each in white, red, green, and blue, a hundred lengths of
Greek linen, a hundred pieces of blanket-cloth, a serdcha, six
pavilions, 9 four candelabra in gold and six in silver enamelled,
four golden basins with ewers to match, and six silver basins,
ten embroidered robes of honour from the Sultan's own ward-
robe and ten caps also worn by him, one of them encrusted
with pearls, ten embroidered quivers one of them encrusted
with pearls, ten swords one of them with a scabbard encrusted
with pearls, dasht-bdn™ that is gloves, embroidered with
pearls, and fifteen eunuchs.
As my fellow-voyagers with this present the Sultan appoint-
4 ed the amir Zahlr al-Dln of Zanjan, one of the most eminent
men of learning, 11 and the eunuch Kafur, the cup-bearer, into
whose keeping the present was entrusted. He sent with us the
amir Muhammad of Harat12 with a thousand horsemen to
escort us to the port of embarkation, and we were accom-
panied by the ambassadors of the king of China, fifteen in
number, the chief of whom was called TursT, along with their
servants, about a hundred men. We set out therefore in a great
company with an imposing body of troops. The Sultan gave
instructions that we were to be supplied with provisions while
3 A cotton fabric, whose exact composition is not known (Hobson-Jobson^ s.v.
Beiramee).
4 Mzik (p. 248, n. 5) would read khazz, a heavy, plushy velvet fabric of
iridescent floss silk.
5 Mzik (p. 248, n. 6) suggests that a HijazT fabric may be meant, $alahi being
an epithet of Mecca.
6 A fine cotton fabric, whose precise character is not known (Hobson-Jobson,
s.v. Shireenbaf).
7 A fine white fabric, perhaps that also called sinabaff (Hobson-Jobson, s.v.
Shambaff, Sinabaff).
8 Mirtzz, the soft down below the outer coarser hair of goats.
9 I.e. one large tent and six small ones.
10 A mistake for dastban, a Persian word.
11 See III, p. 618, where he is described as 'a personage of high dignity at the
Sultan's court', but where n. 91 says that he is not mentioned elsewhere.
See III, p. 606, where he is mentioned as the kutwdl, i.e. chief of police.

774
 BAVANA

we were travelling through his dominions. Our journey began

on the 17thof$afar43[22July 1342]. That was the day selected
because they choose either the 2nd, 7th, 12th, 17th, 22nd, or
27th of the month as the day for setting out on a journey.
On the first day's journey we halted | at the post-station of
Tilbat, two and one-third farsakhs from Dihli. 13 From there
we travelled to the post-station of Awu, thence to the station
of Hilu and thence to the town of Bayana, a large and well-
built town with fine bazaars. 14 Its cathedral-mosque is a mag-
nificent building, the walls and the roof of it being made of
stone. The governor of the town is Muzaffar ibn al-Daya, his
mother being the Sultan's nurse. The governor there before
him was the malik Mujlr ibn Abl al-Raja', one of the principal
maliks, who has been mentioned previously. 15 He claimed
descent from Quraish and was insolent in character and cruel
and tyrannical in rule. He put to death a great number of the
inhabitants of this town and mutilated many of them. I saw
one of its people, a man of fine appearance, sitting in the
portico of his house with both hands and both feet cut off.
The Sultan came on one occasion | to this town and the
citizens complained against this malik Mujir. The Sultan gave
orders to arrest him; a manacle was put upon his neck and he
was kept sitting in the dmdn before the vizier, while the people
of the town presented written complaints of his violence. The
Sultan commanded him to give them satisfaction and he com-
pensated them with sums of money, after which he was put to
death. Among the chief citizens of this town was the learned
imam elzz al-Dln al-Zubairi, a descendant of al-Zubair b. al-
'Awwam (God be pleased with him), a notable and upright
jurist. I met him at Galyur in the service of the malik elzz al-
Dln al-Banatanl known by the title of A'zam Malik. 16

13 Tilpat, already mentioned (III, p. 742) as 'seven miles from the capital'.
14 Awu and Hilu have not been identified satisfactorily on the route from Delhi
to Aligarh. Bayana is some 38 km west of Aligarh. Mzik (p. 249, n. 11) notes that
this implies that I. B. had hitherto been travelling on the west side of the Jumna.
15 See HI, p. 665, n. 37, and p. 710.
16 The malik 'Izz al-Dln Yafcya Bandat was given the title of A'zam Malik
and the fief of Satgaon by the Sultan on his accession (Mahdi Husain, p. 89). This
is confirmed by Bada'unl (tr. G. S. Ranking, 1898, I, p. 302). Satgaon was lost to
Fakhr al-Dln of Bengal and 'Izz al-DTn is mentioned below as supreme amir of
Chanderi (p. 791), and 'Izz al-Dln al-Zubairi as being in his company.

775
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

We journeyed on from Bayana and came to the town of

Kuwil [Koel], a pretty town with orchards, most of their trees
being mangoes. 17 We encamped on a wide plain outside the
town. We met there the pious shaikh and devotee Shams al-
Dln, known as the Ibn Taj al-'Arifin, who was blind | and
advanced in age. Sometime later the Sultan cast him into
prison and he died there - we have already related his story. 18
Account of an expedition in which we took part at Kuwil. On
reaching the town of Kuwil we heard that certain Hindu
infidels had invested and surrounded the town of al-Jalall. 19
Now this town lies at a distance of seven miles from Kuwil, so
we made in that direction. Meanwhile the infidels were en-
gaged in battle with its inhabitants and the latter were on the
verge of destruction. The infidels knew nothing of our
approach until we charged down upon them, though they
numbered about a thousand cavalry and three thousand foot,
and we killed them to the last man and took possession of
their horses and their weapons. Of our party twenty-three
horsemen and fifty-five foot-soldiers suffered martyrdom,
amongst them the eunuch Kafur, the cup-bearer, into whose
hands the present had been entrusted. We informed the Sul-
tan by letter | of his death and halted to await his reply.
During that time the infidels used to swoop down from an
inaccessible hill which is in those parts and raid the environs of
al-Jalali, and our party used to ride out every day with the
commander of that district to assist him in driving them off.
Account of my trial by captivity, and of my deliverance from it and
from hardship thereafter at the hand of one of the saints of God, On
one of these occasions I rode out with several of my friends
and we went into a garden to take our siesta, for this was in the
hot season. Then we heard some shouting, so we mounted our
horses and overtook some infidels who had attacked one of the
villages of al-Jalall. When we pursued them they broke up into
small parties; our troop in following them did the same, and I
was isolated with five others. At this point we were attacked
by a body of cavalry and foot-soldiers from | a thicket there-
abouts, and we fled from them because of their numbers.
Aligarh, originally the name of the citadel, now applied to the whole town
18 See III, pp. 704-5.
19 A small town about 17 km east of Aligarh.

776
 IBN BATTUTA A CAPTIVE

About ten of them pursued me, but afterwards all but three of
them gave up the chase. There was no track at all before me
and the ground there was very stony. My horse's forefeet got
caught between the stones, so I dismounted, freed its foot and
mounted again. It is customary for a man in India to carry two
swords, one called the stirrup-sword, attached to the saddle,
and the other in his quiver. My stirrup-sword fell out of its
scabbard, and as its ornaments were of gold I dismounted,
picked it up, slung it on me and mounted, my pursuers
chasing me all the while. After this I came to a deep nullah, so
I dismounted and climbed down to the bottom of it, and that
was the last I saw of them.
I came out of this into a valley amidst a patch of tangle-
wood, through which there was a track, | so I walked along it, 10
not knowing where it led to. At this juncture about forty of the
infidels, carrying bows in their hands, came out upon me and
surrounded me. I was afraid that they would all shoot at me at
once if I fled from them, and I was wearing no armour so I
threw myself to the ground and surrendered, as they do not
kill those who do that. They seized me and stripped me of
everything that I was carrying except a jubba, 2® shirt and
trousers, then they took me into that patch of jungle, and
finally brought me to the part of it where they were staying
near a tank of water situated amongst those trees. They gave
me bread made of mash, that is peas, 21 and I ate some of it and
drank some water. In their company there were two Muslims
who spoke to me in Persian, and asked me all about myself. I
told them part of my story, but concealed the fact that I had
come from the Sultan. Then they said to me: 'You are sure to
be put to death either by these men or by others, but | this 11
man here (pointing to one of them) is their leader'. So I spoke
to him, using the two Muslims as interpreters, and tried to
conciliate him. He gave me in charge of three of the band, one
of them an old man, with whom was his son, and the third an
evil black fellow. These three spoke to me and I understood
from them that they had received orders to kill me. In the
evening of the same day they carried me off to a cave, but God

20 A loose robe, open in front, with wide, short sleeves.

21 A Hindu word, Phaseolus radiatus, Roxb.

777
 FROM DIHLl TO KINBAYA

sent an ague upon the black, so he put his feet upon me, and
the old man and his son went to sleep. In the morning they
talked among themselves and made signs to me to accompany
them down to the tank. I realized that they were going to kill
me, so I spoke to the old man and tried to gain his favour, and
he took pity on me. I cut off the sleeves of my shirt and gave
them to him so that the other members of the band should not
blame him on my account if I escaped.
About noon we heard voices near the tank and they thought
that it was their comrades, so they made signs to me to go
down with them, but when we went down we found some
12 other people. | The newcomers advised my guards to accom-
pany them but they refused, and the three of them sat down
in front of me, keeping me facing them, and laid on the
ground a hempen rope which they had with them. I was
watching them all the time and saying to myself: 'It is with
this rope that they will bind me when they kill me.' I re-
mained thus for a time, then three of their party, the party that
had captured me, came up and spoke to them and I under-
stood that they said to them: 'Why have you not killed him?'
The old man pointed to the Black, as though he were excus-
ing himself on the ground of his illness. One of these three
was a pleasant-looking youth, and he said to me: 'Do you wish
me to set you at liberty?' I said 'Yes' and he answered 'Go.' So
I took the tunic which I was wearing and gave it to him and he
gave me a worn double-woven [or indigo-dyed] cloak which
he had, and showed me the way. I went off but I was afraid
lest they should change their minds and overtake me, so I
13 went into a reed thicket | and hid there till sunset.
Then I made my way out and followed the track which the
youth had shown me. This led to a pool from which I drank. I
went on till near midnight and came to a hill under which I
slept. In the morning I continued along the track, and some-
time before noon reached a high rocky hill on which there
were sweet lote-trees and zizyphus bushes. I started to pull
and eat the lotus berries so eagerly that the thorns left scars on
my arms that remain there to this day. Coming down from that
hill I entered a plain sown with cotton and containing castor-
oil trees. Here there was a ba'in, which in their language
means a very broad well with a stone casing and steps by
778
 IBN BATTUTA A FUGITIVE

which you go down to reach the water. Some of them have

stone pavilions, arcades, and seats in the centre and on the
sides, and the kings and nobles of the country vie with one
another | in constructing them along the highroads where 14
there is no water. 22 We shall have occasion later on to describe
some of these that we have seen. When I reached the ba'in I
drank some water from it and I found on it some mustard
shoots which had been dropped by their owner when he
washed them. Some of these I ate and saved up the rest, then
I lay down under a castor-oil tree. While I was there about
forty mailed horsemen came to the bo*in to get water and some
of them entered the sown fields, then they went away, and
God sealed their eyes that they did not see me. After them
came about fifty others carrying arms and they too went down
into the bain. One of them came up to a tree opposite the one
I was under, yet he did not discover me. At this point I made
my way into the field of cotton and stayed there the rest of the
day, while they stayed at the bffin washing their clothes and
whiling away the time. At night time their voices died away,
so I knew that they | had either passed on or fallen asleep, is
Thereupon I emerged and followed the trail of the horses, for
the nights were moonlit, continuing till I came to another bffin
with a dome over it. I went down to it, drank some water, ate
some of the mustard shoots which I had, and went into the
dome. I found it full of grasses collected by birds, so I went to
sleep in it. Now and again I felt the movement of an animal
amongst the grass; I suppose it was a snake, but I was too worn
out to pay any attention.
The next morning I went along a broad track, which led to
a ruined village. Then I took another track, but with the same
result as before. Several days passed in this manner. One day
I came to some tangled trees with a tank of water between
them. The space under the trees was like a room, and at the
sides of the tank were plants like dittany and others. I in-
tended to stop there until God should send someone to bring
me | to inhabited country, but I recovered a little strength, so 16
I arose and walked along a track on which I found the traces of
cattle. I found a bull carrying a packsaddle and a sickle, but

22 The word is Hindi and the definition correct.

779
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

after all this track led to the villages of the infidels. Then I
followed up another track and this brought me to a ruined
village. There I saw two naked Blacks, and in fear of them I
remained under some trees there. At nightfall I entered the
village and found a house in one of whose rooms there was
something like a large jar of the sort they make to store grains
in. At the bottom of it there was a hole large enough to admit
a man, so I crept into it and found inside it bedding of
chopped straw, and amongst this a stone on which I laid my
head and went to sleep. On the top of the jar there was a bird
which kept fluttering its wings most of the night -1 suppose it
was frightened, so we made a pair of frightened creatures.
This went on for seven days from the day on which I was
17 taken prisoner, which was | a Saturday. On the seventh day I
came to a village of the infidels which was inhabited and
possessed a tank of water and plots of vegetables. I asked
them for some food but they refused to give me any. How-
ever, in the neighbourhood of a well I found some radish
leaves and ate them. I went into the village, and found a troop
of infidels with sentries posted. The sentries challenged me
but I did not answer them and sat down on the ground. One of
them came over with a drawn sword and raised it to strike me,
but I paid no attention to him, so utterly weary did I feel.
Then he searched me but found nothing on me, so he took
the shirt whose sleeves I had given to the old man who had
had charge of me.
On the eighth day I was consumed with thirst and I had no
water at all. I came to a ruined village but found no tank in it.
They have a custom in those villages of making tanks in which
the rain-water collects, and this supplies them with drinking
is water | all the year round. Then I went along a track and this
brought me to an uncased well over which was a rope of
vegetable fibre, but there was no vessel on it to draw water
with. I took a piece of cloth which I had on my head and tied
it to the rope and sucked the water that soaked into it, but that
did not slake my thirst. I tied on my shoe next and drew up
water in it, but that did not satisfy me either, so I drew water
with it a second time, but the rope broke and the shoe fell
back into the well. I then tied on the other shoe and drank
until my thirst was assuaged. After that I cut the shoe and tied
780
 IBN BATTUJA MEETS A SAINT

its uppers on my foot with the rope of the well and bits of cloth
which I found there. While I was tying this on and wondering
what to do, a person appeared before me. I looked at him, and
lo! it was a black-skinned man, carrying a jug and a staff in his
hand, and a wallet on his shoulder. He gave me [the Muslim]
greeting: 'Peace be upon you' and I replied: 'Upon you be 19
peace and the mercy and blessings of God.' Then he asked
me in Persian Chikas\ 'Who are you?'23 and I answered: 'A man
astray', and he said: 4 So am I.' Thereupon he tied a jug to a
rope which he had with him and drew up some water. I
wished to drink but he saying: 'Have patience', opened his
wallet and brought out a handful of black chick-peas fried with
a little rice. After I had eaten some of this and drunk, he made
his ablutions and prayed two prostrations and I did the same.
Thereupon he asked my name. I answered: 'Muhammad' and
asked him his, to which he replied: 'al-Qalb al-Farib' ['Joyous
Heart']. I took this as a good omen and rejoiced at it. After this
he said to me: 'In the name of God accompany me'. I said: 'Yes*
and walked on with him for a little, then I found my limbs
giving way, and as I was unable to stand up I sat down. He
said: 'What is the matter with you?' I answered: 'I was able to
walk before meeting you, | but now that I have met you, I 20
cannot'. Whereupon he said: 'Glory be to God! Mount on my
shoulder'. I said to him: 'You are weak, and have not strength
enough for that', but he replied: 'God will give me strength.
You must do so'. So I got up on his shoulders and he said to
me: 'Say many times "God is sufficient for us and excellent the
guardian". 24 I repeated this over and over again, but I could
not keep my eyes open, and regained consciousness only on
feeling myself falling to the ground. Then I woke up, but
found no trace of the man and lo! I was in an inhabited village.
I entered it and found it was of Hindu peasants with a Muslim
governor. They informed him about me and he came to meet
me. I asked him the name of this village and he replied: 'Taj
Bura'. 25 The distance from there to Kuwil, where our party

23 Persian, chi kasi.

24 Qur'an, sQra iii, 172.
25 Tajpur, about five km north-west of Aligarh. It is marked on the map of
important historical places in Jamal M. Siddiqi, Migarh: Snippets from the Past, a
pamphlet published in connection with the Indian History Congress, 1975.

781
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

was, is two farsakhs. The governor provided a horse to take me

21 to his house and gave me hot food, and I washed. | Then he said
to me: 'I have here a garment and a turban which were left in
my charge by a certain Arab from Egypt, one of the soldiers
belonging to the camp at Kuwil.' I said to him 'Bring them; I
shall wear them until I reach camp'. When he brought them I
found that they were two of my own garments which I had
given to that very Arab when we came to Kuwil. I was ex-
tremely astonished at this, then I thought of the man who had
carried me on his shoulders and I remembered what the saint
Abu 'Abdallah al-Murshidl26 had told me, as I have related in
the first journey, when he said to me: 'You will enter the land of
India and meet there my brother Dilshad, who will deliver you
from a misfortune which will befall you there'. I remembered
too how he had said, when I asked him his name, 'Joyous Heart'
which, translated into Persian, is Dilshad. So I knew that it was
he whom the saint had foretold that I should meet, and that he
22 too was one of the saints, but I enjoyed no more | of his
company than the short space which I have related.
The same night I wrote to my friends at Kuwil to inform
them of my safety, and they came, bringing me a horse and
clothes and rejoiced at my escape. I found that the Sultan's
reply had reached them and that he had sent a eunuch named
Sunbul thejamdar27 in place of the martyred Kafur, with orders
to pursue our journey. I found too that they had written to the
Sultan about what had happened to me, and that they regarded
this journey as ill-omened on account of what had happened in
the course of it to me and to Kafur, and were wanting to go
back. But when I saw that the Sultan insisted upon the journey,
I urged them on with great determination. They answered: 'Do
you not see what has befallen us at the very outset of this
mission? The Sultan will excuse you, so let us return to him or
stay here until his reply reaches us'. But I said: 'We cannot stay,
23 and wherever we are | his reply will reach us'.
We left Kuwil therefore, and encamped at Burj Bura, where
there is a fine hermitage28 in which lives a beautiful and
26 See I, pp. 28-32.
27 I.e. the cup bearer. His name means spikenard. He is mentioned below (p.
814) as a malik. V
28 Burjpur, about 16 km from Mainpur.

782
 SHAIKH MUHAMMAD THE NAKED

virtuous shaikh called Muhammad the Naked, because he

wears nothing but a cloth from his navel to the ground, with the
rest of his body uncovered. He was the disciple of the pious
saint Mubammad the Naked who inhabited al-Qarafa in Cairo29
God profit us by him.
A story ofthis Shaikh. He was one of the saints of God living upon
the footing of total renunciation and wearing only a tannura,
that is to say a cloth covering his body from the navel down. It
is told of him that when he had prayed the last evening prayer
he cleared out everything that remained in the hospice in the
way of food, seasonings, and water, distributing these to the
poor, and threw the wick from his lamp, so that he began the
day lacking everything. It was his custom to give | his disciples 24
at dawn a meal of bread and beans, and the bakers and bean-
sellers would try to outdo one another in arriving first at his
hospice, when he would take from them enough for the needs
of the poor brethren and would say to the man from whom he
took this 'Sit down', so that he should receive the first charity
which was given to him on that day, whether little or much.
One of the stories told of him relates to the time when Qazan,
the king of the Tatars, advanced into Syria with his armies and
seized Damascus with the exception of its citadel. Al-Malik al-
Nasir went out to drive him off, and the battle took place at a
distance of two days' journey from Damascus at a place called
Qashhab. Al-Malik al-Nasir at that time was still a young man
and inexperienced in warfare. The Naked Shaikh, who was in
his company, alighted, took a shackle and shackled with it al-
Malik al-Nasir's horse so that he should not move from his place
at the moment of battle because of his youth, and thus occasion
the defeat | of the Muslims. Consequently al-Malik al-Nasir 25
held his ground and the Tatars suffered a sweeping defeat in
which many of them were killed and many were drowned in the
waters which were loosed upon them. The Tatars after that
never again made an attack on the lands of Islam. 30 The

29 For I.B.'s description of this famous cemetery see I, pp. 45-8.

30 The story relates to the battle of Marj al-Suffar in April 1303. Ghazan, the
Mongol Ilkhan of Persia, had invaded Syria and temporarily occupied Damascus.
The Mamluk Sultan of Egypt, al-Malik al-Nasir, defeated the Mongols comman-
ded not by the Ilkhan, but by Qutlugh Shah and Amir Choban. I.B.'s Qashhab is
perhaps a mistake for Kushaf, where Qutlugh rejoined the Ilkhan 0- A. Boyle,

783
 FROM DIHLl TO KINBAYA

aforesaid shaikh Muhammad the Naked, the disciple of this

shaikh, told me that he was present at this battle, being then
a young man.
We set out from Burj Bura and encamped at the water
known as Ab-i Siyah, 31 and from there went on to the city of
Qinauj. 32 It is a large, well-built and fortified city; prices there
are cheap and sugar plentiful, being exported from there to
DihlT, and it is surrounded by a great wall. We have had
occasion to mention it before. There was living in it the shaikh
Mu'in al-Dln al-Bakharzi, who offered us hospitality there,
26 and its governor was Flruz | of Badakhshan, a descendant of
Bahram Jur (ChubTn), the companion of Kisra. 33 Among its
inhabitants are a company of pious and upright men cele-
brated for their qualities and known as the 'sons of Sharaf
Jahan'. Their ancestor was the Grand Qao!i in Dawlat Abad, a
man notable for his benevolence and his charities, who
attained to the primacy in religious leadership in the whole
land of India.
A story about him. It is related of Sharaf Jahan that he was at
one time removed from his judgeship, and one of his enemies
charged him before the qao1! who replaced him in office with
being in possession of 10,000 dinars belonging to him [the
plaintiff]. He had no written evidence, and his object was to
have the oath administered to Sharaf Jahan. When the qao1 !
sent for him he said to his messenger: 'What is it he claims
against me?' He replied: '10,000 dinars', whereupon he sent
that sum to the qatfi's tribunal and it was paid over to the
27 plantiff. This came to the knowledge | of Sultan eAla' al-Dln,
who was convinced of the falsity of that claim and restored him
to the judgeship, as well as giving him 10,000 dinars.
We stayed in this city for three nights and during this time
receJved the Sultan's reply to the letter about me, to the effect
that if no trace were found of so-and-so, the qao!l of Dawlat

Cambridge History of Iran, V, p. 394). I.B.'s final remark is incorrect. Ghazan's

successor Oljeitu made an unsuccessful attack on Syria in 1312.
31 The Kalindi river. The name I.B. uses is a Persian translation of the Urdu
kala nadi, 'black river'.
32 Kanauj.
33 I.B. has confused Bahram Gur, the fifth-century Sasanian ruler of Persia,
with the general Bahram Chobin who rebelled against Khusrau Parviz.

784
 ABSTINENT SHAIKHS

Abad, Wajlh al-Mulk, should be his [i.e. my] substitute. We

then continued our journey from this city and alighted at the
post-station of Hanawl, then that of Wazlr-bur, then that of al-
Bajalisa, and then came to the town of Mawri, a small place
with good bazaars. 34 I met there the pious and venerable
shaikh Qut.b al-Dln, called by the title of Haidar of Farghana;
he was suffering from an illness but he gave me his blessing
and supplied me with a loaf of barley bread. He told me that
he was more than a hundred and fifty years old and his
companions related to me that he used to fast continuously |
and for many days on end. He used to make frequent retreats 28
and often remained in his cell for forty days, during which he
would eat forty dates, one on each day. I had myself seen at
Dihll the shaikh known by the name of Rajab al-Burquei go
into his cell with forty dates and remain in it for forty days
after which he came out with thirteen of them still in his
possession. 35
We went on from there and came to the town of Marh, a
large town, inhabited chiefly by infidels under Muslim
control. 36 It is well fortified and produces an excellent wheat,
the like of which is not found elsewhere, and which is ex-
ported from there to DihlT; its grains are long, very yellow, and
large. I have never seen wheat like it except in China. This
town takes its name from the Malawa, a tribe of Hindus, of
powerful build, great size and fine figures; their women espe-
cially are exceedingly beautiful and | famous for their charms 29
in intercourse and the amount of pleasure that they give. So
also are the women of the Marhata and of the Maldive Islands.
From Marh we travelled to 'Alabur, a small town most of
whose inhabitants are infidels under Muslim control. 37 A day's

34 Mzik (p. 263, n. 27) remarks that it is extremely difficult to determine I.B.'s
route from Kanauj to Gwalior. No names resembling Hanaul, Wazirpur or Al-
Bajalisa are to be found in the Etawah district through which he must have
passed. He suggests that Mawri may be Umri. I.B. mentions below (p. 787) a
previous visit to Gwalior, but he nowhere describes the route he took then; it is
possible that he has confused two different journeys.
35 See I, pp. 227-8.
36 Mzik suggests that this may be a scribal error for Mauh.
37 Alapur, some 7 km south-east of Gwalior. Mzik (p. 264, n. 28) notes that
there is another place of the same name, 37 km west-north-west of Gwalior,
which would be away from any route from Kanauj.

785
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

journey from there lived an infidel Sultan, named Qatam, who

was Sultan of Janbll and was killed after besieging Guyalyur
[Gwaliorl. 38
His history. This infidel Sultan had besieged the town of
Rabari, which is on the river Jun and has many villages and
cultivated lands. 39 Its governor was Khappab the Afghani, who
was one of the stalwarts. The infidel Sultan sought the aid of
an infidel Sultan like himself called Raju, whose town is called
30 | Sulpan-Bur. 40 When the two of them invested the city of
Rabari, Khappab sent a message to the Sultan asking him for
help, but the reinforcements were slow in reaching him, as he
was at a distance of forty days' journey from the capital.
Khappab therefore, fearing that the infidels should overpower
him, gathered about three hundred men of the tribe of the
Afghan and a similar number of mamluks and about four
hundred of the other troops. They wound their turban-cloths
on the necks of their horses, this being the custom of the
people of India when they seek death and sell their souls to
God. Khappab and his tribesmen led the way followed by the
rest of the party; they opened the gate at dawn and charged as
one man upon the infidels, who numbered about 15,000. By
the grace of God they routed them, and killed their two
Sultans Qatam and Raju, whose heads they sent to the Sultan
and none of the infidels escaped but some scattered remnants. |
31 Account of the governor of*Aldbur and of his death in battle. The
governor of 'Alabur was the Abyssinian Badr, a slave of the
Sultan's, a man of the kind whose bravery becomes prover-
bial. He was continually making raids on the infidels alone and
single handed, killing and taking captives, so that his fame
spread far and wide and the infidels went in fear of him. He
was tall and corpulent, and used to eat a whole sheep at a
meal, and I was told that after eating he would drink about a
pound and a half of ghee, following the custom of the Abyssin-
ians in their own country. He had a son nearly as brave as
himself.

38 Mzik (p. 264, n. 29) suggests that the reference is to the Raja of Dholpur,
and explains the name as that of the Chambal river.
39 Rabari has not been identified; the river is the Jumna (Yamuna). The
governor is mentioned below (p. 794).
40 Sultanpur, another name for Irijpur in Bundelkhand.

786
 GAI.YUR

It happened that he raided a village of the infidels on one

occasion with a company of his slaves and his horse fell with
him into a matamore. The villagers gathered around him and
one of them struck him with a qattdra^ which is a piece of iron
resembling a ploughshare into which a man inserts his hand |
so that it covers his forearm leaving a projection two cubits in 32
length. 41 A blow with this is mortal, so he killed Badr with that
blow. His slaves put up a vigorous fight, took possession of the
village, killed its men, seized its women and everything in it,
and got the horse out of the matamore safe and sound and
brought it to his son. By a strange coincidence he was
mounted on that same horse and had set out for Dihll when
the infidels came out against him; he fought with them until
he was killed and the horse returned to his companions who
handed it over to his household. Later on a brother-in-law of
his was riding the same horse when the infidels killed him on
it also.
We journeyed next to Galyur or Guyalyur, a large town with
an impregnable fortress isolated on the summit of a lofty hill.
Over its gate is the figure of an elephant with its mahout
carved in stone, | as has been mentioned previously in con- 33
nection with the Sultan Qutb al-Dln. 42 The governor of this
town, Ahmad b. Slrkhan, was a man of upright character, and
he treated me very honourably when I stayed with him on a
previous occasion. 43 One day I came before him as he was
about to have an infidel cut in two. I said to him: 'By God I
beseech you, do not do this, for I have never seen anyone put
to death in my presence'. He ordered the man to be put in
prison so my intervention was the means of his escape.
From Galyur we went on to Parvan, a small town belonging
to the Muslims, but situated in the land of the infidels. 44 Its
governor was Mubammad ibn Bairam, a Turk by origin.

41 Urdu katar, defined as *a dagger having a broad straight blade, the hilt of
which comes up on either side of the wrist, while it is grasped by a crossbar in the
centre' (S. W. Fallen, A New Hindustani-English Dictionary, Banaras, 1879, 2 vols).
42 See III, p. 645.
43 There has been no reference to I.B.'s former visit to Gwalior.
44 Tarwan is almost certainly Narwar in Gwalior State (Ibn Battuta here as
elsewhere rendering a strange name by one more familiar, namely Parwan in
Afghanistan)' (Gibb, Selections, p. 363, n. 5). He notes that there is a place called
Parwai about 40 km north-east of Gwalior.

787
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

There are many tigers there, and one of the inhabitants told
me that a certain tiger used to enter the town by night,
although the gates were shut, and used to seize people. 45 It
34 killed | quite a number of the townsfolk in this way, and they
used to wonder how it made its way in. One of the inhabitants
of the town, Muhammad al-Tawfirl, who was a neighbour of
mine there, told me that it came into his house by night and
carried off a boy who was lying on his bed. Another told me
that he was with a party at a wedding celebration and one of
them went out to relieve nature, when the tiger seized him;
his companions went out in search of him and found him lying
in the bazaar. The tiger had drunk his blood but not eaten his
flesh and they say that this is the way it does with men. Here
is an amazing thing; a certain man told me that it was not a
tiger who did this but a human being, one of the magicians
known asjugts [yogis], appearing in the shape of a tiger. When
I heard this I refused to believe it, but a number of people told
me the same thing so let us give at this point some of the
stories about these magicians. |
35 Account of the magicians called Jugis. The men of this sect do
some marvellous things. One of them will spend months
without eating or drinking, and many of them have holes dug
for them under the earth which are then built in on top of
them, leaving only a space for air to enter. They stay in these
for months, and I heard tell of one of them who remained thus
for a year. In the town of Manjarur [Mangalore] I saw a man of
the Muslims, one of these who learn the arts of these people,
for whom a platform had been put up, on top of which he
stayed without eating or drinking for a space of not less than
twenty-five days. I left him at that point and I do not know
how long he remained after I had gone. The people say that
they make up pills, one of which they take for a given number
36 of days or months, and during that time they require no | food
or drink. They can tell what is happening at a distance. The
Sultan holds them in esteem and admits them to his company.
Some eat nothing but vegetables, and others, the majority, eat

45 The Arabic word, sab\ often denotes a lion, but can be used of other large
predators. Its ability to climb and its blood-sucking propensity suggest a leopard
rather than a tiger.

788
 WITCHCRAFT

no meat; it is obvious that they have so disciplined themselves

in ascetic practices that they have no need of any of the goods
or vanities of this world. There are amongst them some who
merely look at a man and he falls dead under their glance. The
common people say that if the breast of a man killed in this
way is cut open, it is found to contain no heart, and they assert
that his heart has been eaten. This is commonest in the case
of women, and a woman who acts thus is called kaftdr.***
An anecdote. When the great famine was caused in the land of
India by the drought, during the Sultan's absence in the
province of Tiling,47 he despatched an order that the inhabi-
tants of Dihli should be given | an allowance of food at the rate 37
of a pound and a half per person per day. The vizier assem-
bled them and distributed the indigent inhabitants amongst
the amirs and qaclls so that these latter should be responsible
for supplying them with food. My share of them was five
hundred souls; I built for them galleries in two houses and
lodged them there, and I used to give them provisions for five
days every five days. One day they brought me a woman, one
of their number, saying that she was a vkz/fo/r and had eaten the
heart of a boy who was beside her, and they also brought the
dead body of the boy. I ordered them to take her to the
Sultan's lieutenant, who commanded that she should be put
to the test. They filled four jars with water, tied them to her
hands and feet and threw her into the river Jun. As she did not
sink she was known to be a kaftar, had she not floated she
would not have been one. He ordered her then to be burned
with fire. The people of the town came | and collected her 38
ashes, men and women alike, for they believe that anyone
who fumigates himself with them is safe against a kaftans
enchantments during that year.
Anecdote. The Sultan sent for me once when I was with him at
DihlT, and on entering I found him in a private apartment with
some of his intimates and two of these jugs. They were
wearing long cloaks and had their heads covered, because they
remove all their hair with ashes as people generally remove
the hair of the armpits. After the Sultan had ordered me to sit

46 A Persian word for a hyena.

47 See III, p. 644, n. 98.

789
 FROM DIHLl TO KINBAYA

down and I had done so, he said to them: 'This distinguished

man comes from a far country, so show him something that he
has not seen', to which they replied: 'Yes'. One of them
squatted on the ground, then rose from the ground into the air
above our heads, still sitting. I was so astonished and fright-
ened that I fell to the floor in a faint. The Sultan gave orders |
39 to administer to me a potion that he had there and I revived
and sat up. Meantime this man remained in his sitting post-
ure. His companion then took a sandal from a sack he had with
him, and beat it on the ground like one infuriated. The sandal
rose in the air until it came above the neck of the sitting man
and then began hitting him on the neck while he descended
little by little until he sat down alongside us. The Sultan said
to me: 'The man sitting is the pupil of the owner of the
sandal'. Then he said: 'If I did not fear for your reason I would
have ordered them to do still stranger things than this you
have seen'. I took my leave but was affected with palpitation
and fell ill, until he ordered me to be given a draught which
removed it all.
To return to our subject. We travelled from the town of
Parwan to the post-station of Amwari and on to the post-
40 station of Kajarra. 48 Here there is a large tank, about | a mile
in length, on the sides of which there are temples containing
idols which have been mutilated by the Muslims. 49 In the
centre of the tank there are three pavilions of red stone, three
stories high, and on each of the four corners another pavilion.
There live there a company ofjugts who have matted their hair
and let it grow until it has come to be as long as themselves.
They are generally of a yellow colour because of their mortifi-
cations, and many Muslims become their disciples in order to
learn their secrets. They say that if a man suffering from some
bodily disease such as leprosy or elephantiasis resorts to them
for a long time, he will be cured by the grace of God.
The first time that I saw the men of this company was in the
48 Gibb (Selections, p. 363, n. 5) had no doubt that Kajarra was Khajuraho,
famous for the erotic sculptures on the temple walls, but it is far from the route
from Gwalior to Cambay. Amwari cannot be identified with any confidence. Yule
(Cathay, IV, p. 22) comments that I.E. may have been forced to follow a very
devious route 'owing to the interposition of insurgent districts'.
49 Much greater damage has been caused in more recent times by dealers
breaking off erotic sculptures to sell to prurient tourists.

790
 JUGIS

mahalla of Sultan Tarmashirin, king of Turkistan. There were

about fifty of them for whom a cave had been dug under the
earth, and they used to stay in it, never coming out except to
satisfy a need. They had a sort of horn | which they used to 41
sound at the beginning and end of the day and after the first
third of the night. Everything about them is marvellous. It
was one of them who made for the Sultan of the land of
Ma'bar, Sultan Ghiyath al-Din al-Damagham pills, to take as
an aphrodisiac. 50 Amongst their ingredients were iron filings,
and he was so pleased with their effect that he took more of
them than was necessary and died. He was succeeded by his
brother's son Nasir al-Din, who showed high consideration for
that/£gf and raised him in dignity. 51
We went on next to the city of Chandlri, a large town with
magnificent bazaars, and the residence of the supreme gov-
ernor of that province, *Izz al-Din al-Banatam, who has the
title of A'zam Malik. 52 He was a liberal and worthy man who
used to invite the men of learning to his company. Amongst
those who frequented his company were the jurist elzz | al- 42
Din al-Zubairi, 53 the jurist and theologian Wajlh al-Din al-
Bayani (from the town of Bayana which we have already
mentioned), 54 the jurist and qatfi known by the title of Qa^I
Khassa, and their imam Shams al-Din. His deputy for the
business of the treasury was called Qamar al-Din, and his
deputy for the affairs of the army Sa'ada of Telingana, one of
the principal champions; it is before him that the troops pass
in review, A'zam Malik himself not appearing except on
Fridays or rarely on other days.
From Chandlri we continued our journey to the city of
£ihar, which is the chief city of Malwa, the largest district in
that province. 55 It is thickly cultivated, especially with wheat,
and from this city betel leaves are exported to Dihll. The
distance between them is twenty-four days' journey, and all
along the road between them there are pillars on which is
50 See below, p. 862.
51 See below, p. 864.
52 See n. 16 above.
53 See n. 16 above.
54 See p. 775.
55 Mentioned in III, p. 715, but not identified. It must be Dhar, but, as Milk
noted (p. 275, n. 41) I.B. must have passed through Ujjain before reaching Dhar.

791
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

engraved the number of miles from each pillar to the next.

43 When the traveller wishes to know how many miles | he has
gone that day and how far it is to the post-station or to the
town that he is making for, he reads the inscription on the
pillars and so finds out. The city of £ihar is held in fief by
Shaikh Ibrahlm, who comes from the Maldive Islands.
Anecdote. This Shaikh Ibrahlm came originally to this city and
settled outside it, where he restored to cultivation some dead
lands. He used to cultivate melons, and they produced fruits
of superlative sweetness, the like of which were not to be
found in that region. Other people used to cultivate melons on
the neighbouring lands, but they were not like his. He used to
supply food to the poor brethren and the indigent, and when
the Sultan made his expedition to the land of Ma'bar this
Shaikh sent him some melons as a gift. He accepted them,
found them excellent, gave him the city of £ihar in fief and
commanded him to build a hospice on a hill overlooking the
44 town. He erected a very fine hospice there and used | to
supply food in it to travellers of every sort. After he had
continued this practice for some years he presented himself
before the Sultan and brought him thirteen laks, saying: 'This
is the surplus of the money from which I used to supply food
for the people, and the public treasury has a better claim to it
than F. So the Sultan accepted it from him, but did not
approve of his action because of his amassing the money and
not spending it all in providing food.
It was in this city that the sister's son of the vizier Khwaja
Jahan attempted to murder his uncle, to seize his treasures,
and to join the rebel in the province of Ma'bar. 56 His plot
was denounced to his uncle, who seized him together with a
number of the amirs, and sent them to the Sultan. The Sultan
put the amirs to death but sent his sister's son back to the
vizier, who executed him.
Anecdote. When the vizier's sister's son was sent back to him he
gave orders that he should be executed in the same manner as
45 | his associates. The young man had a concubine whom he
loved; he asked her to come and gave her betel, she gave him

56 See I, p. 262 and n. 62. Khwaja Jahan was the title conferred by the Sultan
on Ahmad b. Aiyas. There are a number of references to him in vol. III.

792
 DAWLAT ABAD

betel in return and he embraced her saying farewell. He was

then thrown to the elephants and flayed, and his skin was
stuffed with straw. That night the girl went out of the house
and threw herself into a well close by the place in which he
was killed. She was found dead in the morning and taken out
and his flesh was buried with her in the same grave, which
they call qubur-i-ashiqan meaning in their language 'The
lovers' graves'. 57
We travelled from the town of £ihar to the town of Ujain,
which is a fine and populous city, 58 It was the residence of the
malik Nasir al-Dln son of 'Ain al-Mulk, an upright, generous
and learned man, who suffered martyrdom in the island of
Sandabur at the time of its conquest. I have visited his grave
there and shall describe it in due course. 59 In this town too |
lived the jurist and physician Jamal al-Dln al-MaghribT, who 46
came originally from Gharnapa. 60
From the town of Ujain we continued our journey to Dawlat
Abad, the enormous and important city which rivals Dihli, the
capital, in standing and in the spaciousness of the planning. It
is divided into three sections; one is Dawlat Abad proper, and
is reserved for the Sultan and his troops, the second is called
Kataka, 61 and the third is the citadel, which is unrivalled and
unequalled for its strength and is called Duwayglr. 62
At Dawlat Abad resides the Great Khan Quplu Khan, the
Sultan's preceptor, who is governor of the town, and the
Sultan's lieutenant there and in the lands of Saghar, Tiling,
and their dependent territories. 63 This province extends for
three | months' march, is well-populated, and wholly under 47
his authority and that of his lieutenants. The fortress of
Duwayglr mentioned above is a rock situated in a plain; the
rock has been excavated and a castle built on its summit. It is

57 Persian.
58 Ujjain.
59 I.E. does not keep his promise. For the Muslim capture of Sandabur, i.e.
Goa, see below pp. 819-20.
60 See I. p. 183, and III, p. 685.
61 A Sanskrit word for a royal camp.
62 Deogiri.
63 There are several references to Qutlu Khan in vol. Ill; see especially pp.
On Saghar, see below p. 796. On Tiling see III, p. 644 and n.
98.' 718 and 720.
617,

793
 FROM DIHLI TO KINBAYA

reached by a ladder made of leather, which is taken up at

night. It is occupied by the troops called mufrad^ that is to say,
who are on the register, together with their sons. 64 There is a
prison there, in whose dungeons are imprisoned those con-
victed of serious crime, and in these dungeons there are huge
rats, bigger than cats - in fact, cats run away from them and
cannot defend themselves, for these rats are too strong for
them, so they can be captured only by means of ingenious
devices which are employed to deal with them. I saw them
there and marvelled at them. 65
Anecdote. The malik Khappab al-Afghanl66 told me that he had
once been imprisoned in a dungeon in this fortress, which
went by the name of 'the pit of the rats'. He said: 'They used
48 to collect together by night | to devour me and I fought against
them, which I could only do with great difficulty. I then saw
in a dream a man who said to me: "Recite the sura vlal-Ikhld$
a hundred thousand times and God will deliver you". 67 So I
recited it and when I had completed this number I was re-
leased. The reason for my release was that the malik Mall was
imprisoned in a dungeon adjacent to mine; he fell sick and the
rats ate his fingers and his eyes and he died. When this was
reported to the Sultan he said "Fetch out Khappab in case the
same thing happens to him".' It was to this fortress that Nasir
al-Dln, the son of this same Malik Mall, and the qao1! Jalal fled
for refuge when the Sultan defeated them. 68
The inhabitants of Dawlat Abad belong to the tribe of the
Marhata, whose women God has endowed with special beauty,
particularly in their noses and eyebrows. 69 They have in inter-
49 course | a deliciousness and a knowledge of erotic movements
beyond that of other women. The infidels of this city are

64 The word means 'singular' or 'detached'.

65 M2ik (p. 274, n. 43) thinks it probable that I.B. saw brown rats for the first
time at Deogiri.
66 Mentioned above (p. 786) as governor of Rabari.
67 Qur'an, sura cxii. It is the shortest sura in the Qur'an and is an assertion of
the unity and uniqueness of God.
68 On the persons mentioned and their revolt, see III, pp. 730-35. Mahdi
Husain (284) has noted that, by his own account, I.B. must have left India before
this rebellion.
69 The Mahrattas. Other travellers have shared I.B.'s opinions on their women-
folk.

794
 DAWLAT ABAD

merchants dealing principally in jewels, and their wealth is

enormous. They are called the Sdha, each one of them being
a Sdky and are like the Karimis in Egypt. 70 At Dawlat Abad
there are grapes and pomegranates, both of which produce
fruit twice in the year. It is one of the largest and most
important of the provinces in respect of taxes and land re-
venue, on account of its dense population and the extent of its
territory. I have been told that a certain Hindu contracted for
the farm of the taxes of the town and its province together
(and the latter is, as we have said, a three months' journey) for
seventeen crores, the crore being a hundred laks and the lak a
hundred thousand dinars. But he was unable to fulfil his
obligation; a part of it remained outstanding and his property
was seized and he was flayed. |
Description of the bazaar of the singers. In the city of Dawlat so
Abad there is an exceedingly fine and spacious bazaar for
singers and singing-girls, called Tarab Abad, 71 containing
numerous shops, each of which has a door leading to the
house of its proprietor. Each house has another door as well.
The shop is beautified with carpets, and in the centre of it
there is a sort of large cradle on which the singing-girl sits or
reclines. She is adorned with all kinds of ornaments and her
attendant girls swing her cradle. In the centre of the bazaar
there is a large carpeted and decorated pavilion in which the
chief musician sits every Thursday after the afternoon
prayer, with his servants and slaves in front of him. The
singing-girls come in relays and sing and dance before him
till the sunset prayer, when they withdraw. | In the same si
bazaar there are mosques for the prayer-services, in which
the imams hold the tardwih services during the month of
Ramadan. 72 One of the infidel rulers in India used, on
passing through this bazaar, to alight at the pavilion and the
singing-girls used to sing before him. One of the Muslim
Sultans, too, used to do the same.

70 Sa/t, or SaAu, is a Hindi word for a merchant or banker. The Karimls were a
guild of'merchants prominent in the trade of the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.
M2ik was wrong in connecting the name with Kanem near Lake Chad (p. 275,
n. 67).
71 'The Abode of Joy' (Persian).
72 Additional prayers recited during the nights of Ramadan.

795
 FROM DIHLl TO KINBAYA

We continued on our way to Nadharbar, a small town inha-

bited by the Marhatas, 73 who possess a great skill in the arts,
and are physcians and astrologers. The nobles of the Marhatas
are Brahmans and also Katris [Kshatriyas]. 74 Their food con-
sists of rice, vegetables, and oil of sesame, and they do not
hold with giving pain to or slaughtering animals. They wash
themselves before eating, like our major ablution, and do not
marry among their relatives, unless those who are cousins six
times removed. Neither do they drink wine, for this in their
52 eyes is the greatest of vices. | The Muslims in India take the
same view, and any Muslim who drinks is punished with
eighty stripes, and shut up for three months in a matamore
which is opened only when he is given food.
From this town we journeyed on to §aghar [Songarh], which
is a large town on a great river called by the same name of
Saghar. 75 There are large water-wheels on the river, and there
are orchards in which they grow mangoes, bananas and sugar-
cane. It inhabitants are upright, religious, and trustworthy,
and all their ways are praiseworthy. They have orchards in
which there are hospices for all travellers. Anyone who builds
a hospice gives it the orchard as its endowment and appoints
his sons as its supervisors, and if they die out the supervision
reverts to the qatfls. It is densely populated and people go
there to participate in the blessing conveyed by inhabitants,
and because the town is exempted from taxes and dues. \

73 Nandurbar. M2ik (p. 276, n. 50) notes that I.B. left Daulatabad in the
direction from which he came, and suggests that the embassy may have been
heading for Calicut by land, but had learnt in Daulatabad that the journey would
not be safe, especially because of the value of the presents it was carrying.
74 The Mahratta Khatris claim to be descended from Kshatriyas, the warrior
caste in the fourfold division of ancient Indian society (R. E. Enthoven, The Tribes
and Castes of Bombay, II, p. 207).
75 Songarh; the river is the Tapti. It may or may not be the place mentioned
above (p. 793), for which I.B. uses the same spelling, but which could be Songir,
also south of the river but further to the east and beyond Nandurbar.

796
 CHAPTER XVI

South India
rom the aforesaid §aghar we travelled on to the town of 53

F Kinbaya [Cambay] which is situated on an arm of the

sea resembling a river; 1 it is navigable for ships and its
waters ebb and flow. I myself saw the ships there lying on the
mud at ebb-tide and floating on the water at high tide. This
city is one of the finest there is in regard to the excellence of
its construction and the architecture of its mosques. The reason
is that the majority of its inhabitants are foreign merchants,
who are always building there fine mansions and magnificent
mosques and vie with one another in doing so. Amongst the
great mansions in the town is the house of the sharif al-Samarrl
with whom I was involved in the incident of the sweetmeats,
and to whom the 'king' of the intimate courtiers gave the lie. 2
I have never seen heavier baulks of wood than those which I
saw in this house, and its gate is like that of a city. Beside it
there is | a large mosque which is known by his name. 3 Other 54
mansions are those of the 'king of the merchants' al-Kazarunl,
alongside which is his mosque also, and that of the merchant
Shams al-Din Kulah-Duz, which means the sewer of caps.
Anecdote. On the occasion of the revolt of the qatfi Jalal the
Afghani, which we have related earlier, 4 this Shams al-Din,
together with the ship-owner Ilyas (who was one of the princi-
pal men of this city) and the 'king of the physicians' previously
mentioned, attempted to defend themselves against him in
this city. They set about digging a trench around it, since it
1 Cambay, then an important port, which declined because of the silting of the
harbour.
2 See III, pp. 756-7.
3 His tomb is in the congregational mosque, which had been recently built with
the fragments of Hindu and Jain Temples.
4 See III, pp. 730-34.

797
 SOUTH INDIA

had no wall, but he overcame them and entered the city.

These three went into hiding in a house together, and fearing
that they should be discovered, they made a pact to kill one
another. Each one of them struck the other with a qattdra (we
55 have already described [p. 787] | the nature of this instrument),
and two of them died but the 'king of the physicians' survived.
Among the chief merchants there was also Najm al-Dln of
Jllan, a man of fine figure and immensely wealthy. He built
there a great mansion and a mosque. Some time later the
Sultan sent for him and made him governor of the city, assign-
ing him the ceremonial honours, but the outcome of this was
the loss of his own life and of his fortune.
The governor of Kinbaya at the time of our arrival was
Muqbil of Telingana, who was held in high consideration by
the Sultan. 5 In his company was the Shaikh-Zada of Isfahan,
acting as deputy for him in all his affairs. This shaikh had great
riches and was distinguished by knowledge of the affairs of
government. He was continually sending money to his own
country and devising plans for his escape. This came to the
ears of the Sultan, it being reported of the shaikh that he was
planning to take flight, whereupon he sent written instruc-
tions to Muqbil to dispatch him [to DihlT]. Muqbil despatched
56 him by the post | and he was brought before the Sultan who
placed him under guard. Now customarily at his court when
anyone is placed under surveillance, he rarely escapes death,
but this shaikh made a pact with his guard for a sum which he
would pay him, and the two of them fled together. A trustwor-
thy person told me that they had seen him by a pillar in a
mosque in the city of Qalhat, 6 and that he subsequently
reached his own country, obtained possession of his moneys
and lived in security, having nothing more to fear from that
quarter.
Anecdote. The malik Muqbil gave a banquet for us one day in
his mansion. By an amusing chance the qao1 ! of the city, who
was blind in the right eye, on taking his seat had opposite him
a sharif from Baghdad with a marked resemblance to him in
his features and his blindness, except for the fact that he was

5 See III, pp. 730-34.

6 In 'Oman.

798
 KINBAYA

blind in the left eye. The sharif kept looking at the qatfl and
laughing, and when the qatfl rebuked him he replied: 'Do not
reprove me, for I am more handsome than you.' 'How's that?'
asked the qao!l. 'Because you are blind in the right eye and I 57
am blind in the left', he replied, whereupon the governor and
all those present laughed and the qao1! was put to shame, but
he was unable to make a rejoinder because sharifs are treated
in India with the greatest veneration.
One of the devotees in this city was the Hajj Nasir, of the
people of Diyar Bakr, who lived in one of the pavilions of the
cathedral mosque. We went to visit him there and ate his
food. It happened that when the qao!l Jalal entered the city of
Kinbaya at the time of his rebellion, he came to this saint, and
the Sultan was informed that the latter had prayed for a
blessing on him. For this reason he fled, to avoid being put to
death as al-tfaidari had been. 7 Another of the devotees there
was the merchant Khwaja Ishaq, who has a hospice in which
he supplies food to travellers of every sort. He makes large
donations to the poor brethren and the indigent, yet his
wealth for all that continues to grow and to multiply.
We journeyed from this city to the town of KawT, which is
on a tidal bay also, 8 | and is in the territories of the infidel raja ss
Jalansi, of whom we shall speak later. 9 Thence we went on to
Qandahar, a large town belonging to the infidels and situated
on a bay of the sea. 10
Account of its Sultan. The Sultan of Qandahar is an infidel
called Jalansi, who is under Muslim suzerainty and sends a gift
to the king of India every year. When we reached Qandahar
he came out to welcome us and showed us the greatest hon-
our, himself leaving his palace and installing us in it. The
principal Muslims at his court came to visit us, such as the
children of the Khwaja Buhra. 11 One of these is the ship-
owner IbrahTm, who possesses six vessels of his own. From
this city we continued our journey by sea. |
7 See III, pp. 705-6.
8 Kava, now a mile from the sea.
9 Probably the Rajput tribal name Jhalas, preserved in the name of Jhalawar
district in Kathiawar (Gibb, Selections, p. 363, n. 10).
10 An arabicization of Gandhar, now a fishing village near the mouth of the
Dhandar river. It was formerly a port of some importance, Barbosa's Guindarim
and Linschoten's Gandar.

799
 SOUTH INDIA

59 Account of our embarkation. We embarked on a ship belonging

to the Ibrahlm mentioned above, called al-Jdgir. On this ship
we put seventy of the horses of the Sultan's present, and the
rest we put with the horses of our companions on a ship
belonging to this Ibrahlm's brother, called Manurt. Jalansi
gave us a vessel on which we put the horses of £ahlr al-Dln
and Sunbul and their party, and he furnished it for us with
water, provisions and forage. He sent his son with us on a ship
called al-'Ukairi, which resembles a grab, but is rather
broader; it has sixty oars and is covered with a roof during
battle in order to protect the rowers from arrows and stones. I
myself went on board al-Jdgir, which had a complement of
fifty rowers and fifty Abyssinian men-at-arms. These latter are
60 the guarantors of safety | on this sea; let there be but one of
them on a ship and it will be avoided by the Indian pirates and
idolaters.
Two days later we called at the island of Bairam, which is
uninhabited and at a distance of four miles from the
mainland. 12 We disembarked on this island and took a supply
of water from a tank there. The reason for its devastation is
that the Muslims captured it by force from the infidels and it
has not been inhabited since. The 'king of the merchants'
afore-mentioned wishes to repopulate it and after constructing
a wall for it and setting up mangonels he settled some Mus-
lims on it.
We continued our journey thence and on the following day
arrived at the city of Quqa, a large town with important
bazaars. 13 We anchored four miles from shore on account of
the low tide. I went down into a skiff with some of my
associates at the time of low tide, with the object of going into
61 the town, but the skiff stuck | in the mud when we were about
a mile distant from it. When we sank into the mud I was
leaning upon two of my companions, and the men of the place
11 The Bohras of Gujerat and Bombay are a branch of the IsmatlTs, prominent
as traders and money-lenders. Other Bohras in northern Konkan are SunnTs, often
peasants, and retain many Hindu practices (Hobson-Jobson, s.v. Bora).
12 Perim or Piram, a small island near the mouth of the Gulf of Cambay, a
pirate stronghold until its capture by the Muslims shortly before I.B.'s visit.
Goga. It has been objected to this identification that it is not on the route
from Gandhar to Goa, but the ship may have needed to take on supplies or have
been forced by contrary winds (Mzik, p. 283, n. 64).

800
 SANDABUR

gave me to fear the turn of the tide before I should reach it,
since I was not a good swimmer. But finally I did get to it and
made the circuit of its bazaars and saw there a mosque attri-
buted to al-Khio'r and Ilyas (on them both be peace), in which
I made the sunset prayer. I found in the mosque a number of
poor brethren of the Haidari order along with a shaikh of
theirs. 14 I then returned to the ship.
Account of its Sultan. The Sultan of Quqa is an infidel called
Dunkul, who used to profess submission to the king of India
but was in reality a rebel.
On setting sail from this town we arrived after three days at
the island of Sandabur [Goa], an island in which there are
thirty-six | villages. 1S It is surrounded by a gulf, the waters of 62
which are sweet and agreeable at low tide but salt and bitter at
high tide. In the centre of the island are two cities, an ancient
one built by the infidels, and the other built by the Muslims
when they first captured the island. 16 In the latter there is a
great cathedral mosque, resembling those of Baghdad, built
by the shipowner Hasan, the father of the Sultan Jamal al-Din
Muhammad of Hinawr, who will be mentioned hereafter, as
well as my presence with him on the occasion of the second
capture of this island, if God will. 17 [On this occasion] we did
not stop at this island when we passed by it, but anchored at a
smaller one near the mainland, in which there was a temple,
an orchard, and a water-tank, and on which we found one of
thcjuffs. 18
The story of this jug. When we landed on this smaller island we
found | there ajugf leaning against the wall of a budkhana, that 63
is an idol-temple; 19 he was between two of its idols and
showed the traces of continuous practice of religious auster-
ities. When we spoke to him he did not say a word, and we
looked to see if there was any food with him but did not see

14 See II, p. 274 and n. 15, and III, p. 583 and n. 175.
15 According to Barros, Goa was formerly known as Ticuari (Marathi: Tiswadi,
i.e. 30 villages).
16 Goa was first captured by the Muslims in 1312, but subsequently changed
hands more than once.
17 See below pp. 803-5 and 819-21.
18 Anjidiv.
19 Notwithstanding its etymology the word is applied to any temple with idols,
whether Buddhist, Hindu or Jain.

801
 SOUTH INDIA

any. While we were still looking he uttered a great shout, and

as he shouted a coconut fell from a coco-palm in front of him.
He handed it to us and we in astonishment gave him some
dinars and dirhams, which he would not accept, and when we
brought him provisions he refused them also. There was a
cloak of camel-hair lying on the ground in front of him; I took
it in hand to examine it and he gave it to me. I had in my hand
a chaplet of Zaila'; 20 he examined it in my hand so I gave it
to him. He rubbed it between his fingers, smelt it, kissed it,
and pointed first to the sky and then in the direction of Mecca.
My companions did not understand his signs, but I for my part
understood him to indicate that he was a Muslim who was
64 concealing his Muslim belief from the people of that island
and living on those coconuts. When we were about to leave
him I kissed his hand; rny companions disapproved of that,
but he perceived their disapproval and taking my hand kissed
it and smiled and signed to us to go. So we left, I being the last
of my party to go out, when he tugged at my cloak; I turned
my head towards him and he gave me ten dinars. When we
came out of the place my companions said to me: 'Why did he
pull you?' and I told them that he had given me those dinars.
I gave three of them to £ahlr al-Dln and three to Sunbul,
saying to them: 'The man is a Muslim; do you not see how he
pointed to the sky to indicate that he knew God, and then to
Mecca to indicate his knowledge of the Apostle (peace be
upon him)? And his taking of the chaplet confirms the fact.'
They went back when I said this to them but they could not
find him.
We set out again immediately and on the next day reached
65 | the town of Hinawr, which is on a large inlet into which large
ships enter. 21 The town itself is half a mile from the sea.
During the bushkal, which is the rainy season, 22 this bay is so
stormy and boisterous that for four months it is impossible for
anyone to sail on it except for fishing.
On the day of our arrival at this place one of the HinduyV/gw

20 The Arabic could also be translated as 'a chaplet of cowries'. This is perhaps
more likely. I.B. called Zaila' 'the dirtiest, most disagreeable, and most stinking
town in the world' and avoided spending the night on shore (II, p. 373).
21 Honavar.
22 Hindi, pashkal^ the rainy season.

802
 HINAWR

came to me secretly and gave me six dinars saying to me: 'The

Brahman has sent this to you', meaning thejugf to whom I had
given the chaplet. When he gave me the dinars I took them
from him and offered him one of them, but he declined it and
withdrew. I told my companions what had happened and said
to them: 'If you wish your share of them [you may have it].'
They both refused but were full of astonishment at the ways
of this person and said to me: 'The six dinars which you gave
us we left with six others between the two idols | in the place 66
where we found him.' I was greatly astonished at our adven-
ture with this person and kept with special care those dinars
that he had given me.
The people of the city of Hinawr are ShafTites in doctrine,
upright, religious, engaged in warfare on the sea, and mighty.
They were celebrated in this respect until time brought them
low after their conquest of Sandabur, which we shall relate.
Amongst the devotees whom I met in this city was the shaikh
Muhammad al-Naqawri, who entertained me in his hospice.
He used to cook the food with his own hand, regarding it as
defiled by the maidservant and the manservant. I met there
also the jurist Isma'Il, the instructor in the Book of God, who
was a scrupulous man of good disposition and generous nature,
also the qao!l there, Nur al-Din eAH, and the preacher, whose
name I do not remember.
The women of this town and of all these coastal districts
wear no | sewn garments but only unsewn lengths of cloth, 67
one end of which they gird round their waists, and drape the
rest over their head and chest. They are beautiful and
virtuous, and each wears a gold ring in her nose. One
peculiarity amongst them is that they all know the Qur'an by
heart. I saw in the town thirteen schools for girls and twenty-
three for boys, a thing which I have never seen elsewhere.
Its inhabitants live by maritime commerce, and have no
cultivated land. The people of Mulaibar pay a fixed sum
annually to Sultan Jamal al-Din, through fear of his sea-
power. His army consists of about six thousand men, horse
and foot.
Account of the Sultan of Hinawr. He is the Sultan Jamal al-Din
Mubammad ibn | tfasan, one of the best and most powerful 68
Sultans. He is under the suzerainty of an infidel Sultan named
803
 SOUTH INDIA

Haryab, of whom we shall speak later. 23 The Sultan Jamal al-

Dm is assiduous in attending the congregational prayers. It is
his custom to come to the mosque before daybreak and to read
the Qur'an until the rising of the dawn, when he prays at the
earliest moment. He then rides outside the city and returns
about the middle of the forenoon, when he goes first to the
mosque and prostrates himself there before going into his
palace. He fasts regularly during the 'white days' [when the
moon is at the full]. During my stay with him he used to invite
me to break my fast in his company; I and the jurist 'All and
the jurist Isma'Il would present ourselves, and four small
stools would be placed on the ground, on one of which the
Sultan would sit and each of us on another. |
69 Account of the order observed in his banquet. The order of this was
as follows. A brass table (which they call khawanjah}2-* is
brought in and there is set on it a brass platter (which they call
tdlam). 25 A beautiful slave-girl wrapped in a silk robe then
comes and sets in front of him the pots of food; she carries a
large brown ladle and with it she ladles out a single spoonful
of rice and puts it into the (alam, then sprinkles over it ghee
and puts along with this bunches of salted peppers and green
ginger, salted lemons, and mangoes. One eats a mouthful [of
rice] and follows it up with some of these preserves, and when
the first ladleful which she placed in the t.dlam is finished she
takes out another ladleful of rice and puts a cooked fowl into a
bowl, and the rice is eaten with this also. When the second
ladleful is finished she ladles out again and puts out another
70 kind of fowl, which one eats with it. When | the different
kinds of fowls are finished they bring various sorts offish, with
which they eat rice also, and when the different fish dishes are
emptied they bring vegetables cooked with ghee and prepara-
tions of milk, and they eat rice with these too. When all these
are done with they bring kushdn, which is curdled milk, with
which they end up their service of food. When this is served it
is a signal that there is nothing else to be eaten after it. Finally
they drink warm water on top of this, for cold water would be
harmful to them in the season of the rains.
23 He is not mentioned again.
24 Persian, khwdncheh,
25 Arabic (u/m, a pastry board.

804
 MULAIBAR

On another occasion I stayed for eleven months at the court

of this Sultan without ever eating bread, for their sole food is
rice. I lived also in the Maldive Islands, Ceylon, and on the
Ma'bar and Mulaibar coasts for three years eating nothing
but rice, until I could not swallow it except by taking water
with it.
The clothes worn by their Sultan are cloaks of silk and fine
linen; he ties a waist-cloth round his middle and puts on two
cloaks, one on top of j the other. He plaits his hair and winds 71
on a small turban. When he rides out he puts on a military
jacket and wears two cloaks above it, and drums and trumpets
are carried by men and sounded before him. On this occasion
we stayed with him for three days; he supplied us with provi-
sions, and we left him to continue our journey.
Three days later we reached the land of Mulaibar [Mala-
bar], which is the pepper country. It extends for two months'
journey along the coast from Sandabur to Kawlam [Quilon].
The road over the whole distance runs beneath the shade of
trees, and at every half-mile there is a wooden shed with
benches on which travellers of every kind, whether Muslims
or infidels, may sit. At each shed there is a well for drinking
and an infidel who is in charge of it. If the traveller is an infidel
he gives him water in vessels; if he is a Muslim he pours the
water into his hands, | continuing to do so until he signs to him 72
to stop or stops him. It is the custom of the infidels in the
Mulaibar lands that no Muslim may enter their houses or eat
from their vessels; if he does so they break the vessels or give
them to the Muslims. If a Muslim goes into a place there in
which there is no house belonging to Muslims, they cook food
for him, putting it on banana leaves, and put the condiments
over it, and birds eat what is left. At all the halting-places on
this road there are houses belonging to Muslims, at which
Muslim travellers alight, and where they buy all that they
need, and food is cooked for them. Were it not for these
Muslims, no Muslim would travel by this road.
On this road, which, as we have said, extends for a two
months' march, there is not a span of ground or more but is |
cultivated. Every man has his own separate orchard, with his 73
house in the middle and a wooden palisade all round it. The
road runs through the orchards, and when it comes to a palisade
805
 SOUTH INDIA

there are wooden steps to go up by and another flight of steps

down into the next orchard. So it goes on for two months. No
one travels on an animal in that country, and only the Sultan
possesses horses. The principal vehicle of the inhabitants is a
dula carried on the shoulders of slaves or hired porters; 26 those
who do not travel in a dula go on foot, be they who they may.
If a man has baggage or merchandise or anything of the kind,
it is transported by hired carriers on their backs, and you may
see a single merchant with a hundred such or less or more
carrying his goods. Each porter has in his hand a stout staff,
with an iron ferrule, and at the upper end an iron crook. When
74 he is tired out, and finds no | bench on which to rest, he sticks
his staff in the ground and hangs his load from the crook, and
after resting resumes his load without assistance and goes on
with it. I have never seen a safer road than this, for they put to
death anyone who steals a single nut, and if any fruit falls no
one picks it up but the owner. I was told that some Hindus
travelled by this road, and one of them picked up a nut. When
the governor was informed of this, he ordered a stake to be
fixed in the ground; its upper end was sharpened and inserted
into a wooden spar so that it protruded from it. The man was
stretched on the spar, belly downwards, and transfixed on the
stake until it came out of his back, and he was left like that as
an example to the beholders. There are many such stakes on
this road, so that people may see them and be warned. We
75 sometimes met infidels during the night on this road, and
when they saw us they stood aside to let us pass. Muslims are
shown the highest consideration on it except that, as we have
said, they do not eat with them nor allow them into their
houses.
In the Mulaibar lands there are twelve infidel Sultans, some
of them strong with armies numbering fifty thousand men,
and others weak with armies of three thousand. Yet there is no
discord whatever between them, and the strong has no ambi-
tion to seize the possessions of the weak. At the boundary of
the territories of each ruler there is a wooden gateway, on
which is engraved the name of the ruler whose territories
begin at that point. This is called 'The Gate of Security' of

26 Hindi deli, a litter.

806
 MULAIBAR

such-a-such prince. If any Muslim or infidel criminal flees

from the territories of one and reaches the Gate of Security of
another, his life is safe and the prince from whom he has fled
cannot seize him, even though he be a powerful prince | with 76
a great army. The Sultans in these lands transmit their sover-
eignty to their sisters' sons, to the exclusion of their own
children. I have seen this practice nowhere else except among
the veiled Massufa, who will be mentioned later. 27 When a
Sultan in the land of Mulaibar wishes to stop people from
buying and selling he orders one of his manservants to hang
over the shops branches of trees with their leaves, and no one
either sells or buys so long as these branches remain hanging.
Description of pepper. The pepper-trees resemble grape-vines;
they are planted alongside coco-palms and climb up them in
the same way that vines climb, except that they have no
shoots, that is to say tendrils, like those of vines. The leaves
of the trees resemble | those of stocks [or, according to a variant 77
reading, horses' ears], and some of them resemble the leaves of
briar. It produces its fruit in small clusters, the grains of which
resemble the grains of abu qinninah2* when they are green. In
the autumn they gather the grains and spread them on mats in
the sun, just as is done with grapes in order to obtain raisins;
they keep on turning them until they are thoroughly dried and
become black, and then sell them to the merchants. Most
people in our country suppose that they roast them with fire
and that it is because of that they become crinkled, but it is
not so since this results only from the action of the sun upon
them. I have seen pepper grains in the city of Qaliqup being
poured out for measuring by the bushel, like millet in our
country.
The first town in the land of Mulaibar that we entered was
the town of Abu Sarur [Barcelore], a small place on a large
inlet and abounding in coco-palms. The chief of the Muslims
here is Shaikh Jum'a, known as Abu Sitta, \ a most charitable 78
27 See below pp. 951-2. The Massufa, Berbers of the western Sahara, were
distinguished by a matrilineal social structure. The name was often given by
medieval Muslim writers to the Tuaregs, among whom the lower part of the face
is veiled.
28 I.e. the date palm, Phoenix dactylifera, L. The word qinnina, 'flask', is used in
the Sahara for a semispherical scoop made from the wood of the date palm, which
is therefore called the 'father of the scoop'.

807
 SOUTH INDIA

man, who spent all that he had on the poor brethren and the
indigent. Two days' journey from there brought us to Fakanur
[Bacanor], a large town on an inlet; 29 here there is a large
quantity of fine-flavoured sugar-canes, which are unexcelled
in the rest of that country. There is a Muslim community
here, whose chief is called tfusain al-Salap, and it has a qao1!
and a preacher. This Husain built a mosque in the town for
the holding of the Friday prayer.
Account of its Sultan. The Sultan of Fakanur is an infidel called
Basadaw. He possesses about thirty warships, commanded by
a Muslim called Lula, who is an evildoer and a pirate and a
79 robber of merchants. When we anchored at Fakanur | the
Sultan sent his son to stay on board the ship as a hostage. We
went on shore to visit him and he treated us with the utmost
hospitality for three nights, as a mark of respect for the Sultan
of India and acknowledgement of what was due to him, and
also from a desire to make some profit by trading with the
personnel of our vessels. It is a custom of theirs that every ship
that passes by a town must needs anchor at it and give a
present to the ruler. This they call the 'right of bandar* ** If
anyone omits to do this, they sail out in pursuit of him, bring
him into the port by force, double the tax on him, and prevent
him from proceeding on his journey for as long as they wish.
Three days after leaving Fakanur we reached Manjarur
[Mangalore], a large town on the inlet called Khaur al-Dunb^
so which is the largest inlet in the land of Mulaibar. | This is the
town at which most of the merchants from Fars and al-Yaman
disembark, and pepper and ginger are exceedingly abundant
there.
Account of the Sultan of Manjarur. He is one of the principal
rulers in that land, and his name is Rama Daw. 31 There is a
colony of about four thousand Muslims there, living in a
suburb alongside the town. Warfare frequently breaks out
between them and the townspeople, but the Sultan makes
peace between them on account of his need of the merchants.

29 Now Barkur.
30 M2ik (p. 295, n. 75) argues that the word bandar in this phrase is not the
common word for a port in Persian and Arabic, but is the Sanskrit bhandara,
meaning a storehouse or treasury, and that the customs dues are intended
31 Ram Deo.

808
 MULAIBAR

There is a qao!i there, a distinguished and generous man of the

Shafi'I madhhab, called Badr al-Dln of al-Maebar, who also
teaches religious science. He came on board the vessel to
meet us and invited us to go ashore to visit his town, but we
said: 'Not until the Sultan sends his son to stay on board the
vessel.' He answered: 'This is done only by the Sultan of
Fakanur because the Muslims in his town are powerless, but
as for us the Sultan | is afraid of us', but we refused to land si
until the Sultan sent his son. When he had done so, as the
previous Sultan had done, we went on shore and were treated
by them with great consideration.
After staying with them for three days, we set sail for the
town of Hill, which we reached two days later. 32 It is large and
well-built, situated on a big bay which is navigable for large
vessels. This is the farthest town reached by ships from China;
they enter only this port, the port of Kawlam, and Qaliquf. The
town of Hill is venerated both by Muslims and infidels on
account of its cathedral mosque, for it is of great blessedness,
and resplendent with radiant light. Seafarers make many votive
offerings to it, 33 and it has a rich treasury under the super-
vision of the preacher ftusain and the chief of the Muslim
community, I^asan al-Wazzan. | In this mosque also there are 82
a number of students of religious science who receive stipends
from its revenue, and it has a kitchen from which all travellers
and the poor Muslims of the town are supplied with food. I
met in this mosque a pious jurist from Maqdashaw,34 called
Saeld, of fine figure and character. He used to fast con-
tinually, and I was told that he had studied at Mecca for
fourteen years and for the same length of time at al-Madlna,
had met Abu Numayy the Amir of Mecca35 and Mansur b.
Jammaz, the Amir of al-Madlna, and had travelled in India
and China.
We then continued our journey from Hill to the town of
32 This name survives in that of Mount Dely. 'The medieval port is probably
now represented by the village of Nileshwar, a few miles north of the promontory'
(Gibb, Selections, p. 364, n. 14).
33 There is a small mosque on the summit, which is a conspicuous landmark for
sailors, and is visited by pilgrims.
34 Mogadishu, in Somalia.
35 Abu Numayy, ruler of Mecca 652-701/1254-1301. For an anecdote about
him, see I, p. 223.

809
 SOUTH INDIA

Jurfattan36 between which and Hill there is a distance of three

farsakhs. I met there a highly estimable jurist from Baghdad,
83 called al-$arsarl after the name of a township ten miles | from
Baghdad on the Kufa road, the name of which is the same as
the §arsar in our country in the Maghrib. He had a brother in
this city, a wealthy man with small children, who had died
leaving them in his charge, and when I left he was preparing
to take them to Baghdad. It is the custom of the people of
India, like that of the negroes, not to interfere with the estate
of any deceased person, even though he leaves thousands, but
his property remains in the hands of the leader of the Muslim
community until his legal inheritor takes it over.
Account of the Sultan of Jurfattan. He is called Kuwail, and is
one of the most powerful Sultans of Mulaibar. He possesses a
large fleet of vessels which sail to 'Oman, Pars, and al-
Yaman, and his territories include Dahfattan and Budfattan37 1
84 which we shall describe. We went on from Jurfattan to the
town of Dahfattan which is a large town on an inlet with many
orchards, in which there are coco-palms, pepper trees, areca
palms and betel plants, as well as great quantities of colocasia
which they cook along with meat. As for bananas, never have
I seen any place in which they are more numerous or cheaper.
At Dahfattan there is an immense bffin, five hundred paces in
length and three hundred in breadth, cased with red stones
squared. On its sides are twenty-eight stone pavilions, each of
which contains four stone loggias, and is approached by a
flight of steps in stone. In the middle of the tank there is a
large pavilion three stories high, with four loggias on each
story. It was told me that it was the father of the present
Sultan Kuwail who constructed this bo1 in. Alongside it is a
cathedral mosque of the Muslims, which has a flight of steps
by which one goes down to the tank, and the people make
85 their ablutions | and bathe in it. The jurist Husain told me that
the builder of both the mosque and the bffin was a certain

36
Yule (Cathay, IV, p. 76) identifies it as 'probably' Cannanore, Mzik (p. 297,
n. 79) as either Baliapatam or Cannanore, and Gibb (Selections, p. 234) as Can-
nanore, without comment. Yule connects the name given to the Sultan by I.E.,
Kuwail, with Kolatiri, the name of the Rajas of Cannanore.
37 Dharmapatam and Puduppattana, of which the latter has disappeared from
modern maps.

810
 MULAIBAR

ancestor of Kuwail and that he was a Muslim whose con-

version was due to a strange event which we shall relate
here.
Account of the marvellous tree which is alongside the mosque. I saw
that the mosque was by a tender green tree with leaves like fig
leaves, but smooth, surrounded by a wall. Beside it was a
mihrdb in which I made a prayer of two raffas. This tree is
known amongst them as dirakht alshahddah?* I was told there
that in the autumn of each year a single leaf falls from this tree
after it has turned first yellow and then red, and that written
on it by the pen of the divine power there are the words There
is no god but \ Allah, Muhammad is the apostle of Allah. The jurist 86
Husain and a number of trustworthy persons told me that they
had seen this leaf with their own eyes and had read that which
was written on it. He told me also that at the time of its falling
trustworthy persons from among both the Muslims and the
infidels sit underneath the tree, and when the leaf falls the
Muslims take half of it and the other half is placed in the
treasury of the infidel Sultan, and they use it for the healing of
the sick. This tree was the cause of the conversion to Islam of
Kuwait's ancestor who constructed the mosque and the tank.
He was able to read the Arabic script and when he read and
understood the meaning of what was written on the leaf he
embraced Islam and lived as a good Muslim. His story has
been handed down amongst them by many witnesses. The
jurist yusain related to me that one of his sons reverted to
idolatry after his father's death and governed with violence.
He ordered | that the tree should be pulled out by the roots, 87
which was done so that no trace was left of it, and afterwards it
sprouted up again and became as fine as it had ever been, and
the infidel perished swiftly.
From there we continued our journey to the city of Budfat-
tan, a large town on a large inlet. Outside it and close to the
sea there is a mosque to which Muslim strangers repair, for
there is no Muslim in this city. Its port is very fine indeed and
its water is sweet; the areca nut grows there in profusion and is
exported from it to India and China. The majority of its
inhabitants are Brahmans, who are venerated amongst the

38 'The tree of testimony' (Persian).

811
 SOUTH INDIA

infidels and who hate the Muslims, and it is for this reason that
there is no Muslim living amongst them.
Anecdote. I was told that the reason why they leave this mosque
undestroyed is that one of the Brahmans demolished its roof to
as use it for a roof for his own house, and afterwards his house
caught fire and he and his children and his goods were all
burnt up. So they respect this mosque and have not molested
it since, but they serve it, placing outside it water from which
all sorts of travellers may drink, and putting a net over its door
so that the birds should not go into it.
From Budfattan we continued our journey to Fandarayna
[Panderani], a large and fine town with orchards and bazaars. 39
The Muslims occupy three quarters in it, each of which has a
mosque. The cathedral mosque is on the sea front, a magnifi-
cent building with gazebos and loggias overlooking the sea. Its
qatfl and preacher is a man from 'Oman, and he has a
brother, a worthy man. It is at this town that the Chinese
vessels pass the winter. Thence we travelled to the town of
89 Qaliqup [Calicut], which is one of the chief ports in | Mulaibar.
It is visited by men from China, Jawa, Ceylon, the Maldives,
al-Yaman and Pars, and in it gather merchants from all quar-
ters. Its harbour is one of the largest in the world.
Account of its Sultan. The Sultan of Qaliquf is an infidel, known
as "fAeSamarf. 40 He is an aged man and shaves his beard, as
some of the Greeks do. I saw him there and we shall speak of
him later, if God will. The amir of the merchants there was
Ibrahlm Shahbandar, 41 of the people of Bahrain, a worthy
man, of generous habits, at whose house the merchants used
to gather and to eat at his table. The qao!i of the place was
Fakhr ad-Din 'Othman, a worthy and charitable man, and
the superior of the hospice there was the shaikh Shihab al-Din
of Kazarun, to whom are paid the offerings made in vows by
the people of India and China to the shaikh Abu Isfcaq al-
39 Vasco da Gama anchored here before reaching Calicut; the site is now
deserted.
40 Malayalam samutira or satnuri, a vernacular form of the Sanskrit for 'sea
king', converted by the Portuguese into Samorin or Zamorin, which became the
usual word in European languages.
41 'The tide of ... the chief authority with whom foreign traders and ship-
masters had to transact. He was often also head of the Customs' (Hobson-Jobson,
s.v. Shahbunder). See above p. 808 n. 30.

812
 CHINESE SHIPS

Kazaruni, God profit us by him. 42 In this | town too lives the 90

famous shipowner Mithqal, who possesses vast wealth and
many ships for his trade with India, China, al-Yaman, and
Pars. When we reached the city, the shahbandar Ibrahim, the
qa^T, the Shaikh Shihab-al-Dm, the principal merchants and
the infidel Sultan's deputy, by the name of Qulaj, all came out
to welcome us, with drums, trumpets, bugles and standards
on their ships. We entered the harbour in great pomp, the like
of which I have never seen in those lands, but it was a joy to
be followed by distress. We stopped in the port of Qaliqup, in
which there were at the time thirteen Chinese vessels, and
disembarked. Every one of us was lodged in a house, and we
stayed there three months as | the guests of the infidel, await- 91
ing the season of the voyage to China. On the sea of China
travelling is done in Chinese ships only, so we shall describe
their arrangements.
Description of the Chinese vessels. The Chinese vessels are of
three kinds; large ships called junks, middle sized ones called
zaws, and small ones called kakams** The large ships have
anything from twelve down to three sails, which are made of
bamboo rods plaited like mats. They are never lowered, but
they turn them according to the direction of the wind; at
anchor they are left floating in the wind. A ship carries a
complement of a thousand men, six hundred of whom are
sailors and four hundred men-at-arms, | including archers, 92
men with shields and arbalists, that is men who throw naphtha.
Each large vessel is accompanied by three smaller ones, the
'half, the 'third', and the 'quarter'. These vessels are built
only in the town of Zaitun in China [Ch'iian-chou], or in §In-
Kalan, which is §In al-§Tn [Canton].
Their method of building the ships is to construct two walls
of timber, the space between which they fill up with immensely
large baulks of wood fastened both in length and breadth by
huge nails each of which is three cubits in length. When the
two walls are firmly joined together by these baulks they build

42 See II, pp. 319-20 and n. 151. At Quilon I.B. was to stay at the hospice of
shaikh Fakhr al-Dln, the son of Shihab al-Dm (below, p. 818). He mentions
another hospice of the same fraternity at Ch'uan-chou (below, p. 895).
43 I.e. junk, dhow and hoa-ch'iian or trade ship. Cordier (Yule, Cathay, IV, p. 25
n. 1) suggests that kakam may be a corruption of old Italian cocca.

813
 SOUTH INDIA

on top of them the bottom flooring of the vessel, and launch

them into the sea, where they complete the construction of
the ship. Since these baulks and side-walls remain in contact
with the water, they go down to them in order to wash them-
selves and to relieve nature. At the sides of these baulks are
their oars, which are as large as masts, ten or fifteen men
93 joining together to work each of them, | and they row standing
on their feet. In the vessel they build four decks, and it has
cabins, suites and salons for merchants; a set of rooms has
several rooms and a latrine; it can be locked by its occupant,
and he can take along with him slave-girls and wives. Often a
man will live in his suite unknown to any of the others on
board until they meet on reaching some town. The sailors
have their children living on board ship, and they cultivate
green stuffs, vegetables and ginger in wooden tanks. The
owner's factor on board ship is like a great amir. When he goes
on shore he is preceded by archers and Abyssinians with
javelins, swords, drums, bugles and trumpets. On reaching
the house where he is to stay they stand their lances on both
94 sides of the door, and continue thus | during his stay. Some of
the Chinese own large numbers of ships on which their factors
are sent to foreign countries. There is no people in the world
wealthier than the Chinese.
Account of our preparations for the voyage to China, and how it all
ended. When the time came for the voyage to China, the
Sultan al-Samari equipped for us one of the thirteen junks in
the port of Qaliqup. The factor on the junk was called Sulai-
man of §afad, in Syria. I had made his acquaintance previously
and I said to him: 'I want a set to myself because of the slave-
girls, for it is my habit never to travel without them.' He
replied: 'The merchants from China have hired the sets for
the outward and return journey. My son-in-law has one which
95 I can give you, but it has no lavatory; | perhaps you may be
able to exchange it for another.' So I ordered my companions
to take on board all my effects, and the male and female slaves
embarked on the junk. This was on a Thursday, and I stayed
on shore in order to attend the Friday prayers and join them
afterwards. The malik Sunbul and £ahlr al-Dln also went on
board with the present. Early on the Friday morning a slave-
boy I had named Hilal came to me and said that the set we had
814
 THE FLEET WRECKED

taken on the junk was small and unsuitable. When I spoke of

this to the captain he said: 4 It cannot be helped, but if you like
to transfer to the kakam there are sets of rooms on it at your
choice.' I agreed to this and gave orders accordingly to my
companions, who transferred the slave-girls and effects to the
kakam and were settled in it before the hour of the Friday
prayer.
Now it is usual for this sea to become stormy every day in
the late afternoon, and no one can embark then. The junks %
had already set sail, and none of them were left but the one
which contained the present, another junk whose owners had
decided to pass the winter at Fandarayna, and the kakam
referred to. We spent the Friday night on the seashore, we
unable to embark on the kakam, and those on board unable to
disembark and join us. I had nothing left but a carpet to
spread out. On the Saturday morning the junk and kakam were
both at a distance from the port, and the junk whose owners
were making for Fandarayna was driven ashore and broken in
pieces. Some of those who were on board died and some
escaped. In it there was a slave-girl who belonged to one of
the merchants, and a favourite of his. He offered to give ten
dinars in gold to anyone who would rescue her (for she had
clung to a spar in the stern of the junk). A sailor from Hurmuz
undertook to do it, and brought her ashore but would not take
the dinars, saying: 'I did this only | for the sake of God.' 97
That night the sea struck the junk which carried the Sul-
tan's present, and all on board died. In the morning we went
to the scene of their disaster; I saw £ahir ad-Din with his head
smashed and his brains scattered, and the malik Sunbul had a
nail driven through one of his temples and coming out at the
other, and having prayed over them we buried them. I saw the
infidel, the Sultan of Qaliqup, wearing a large white cloth
round his waist, folded over from his navel down to his knee,
and with it a small turban on his head, bare-footed, with the
parasol carried by a slave over his head and a fire lit in front of
him on the beach; his police officers were beating the people
to prevent them from plundering what the sea cast up. In all
the lands of Mulaibar, except in this one land alone, it is the
custom that whenever a ship is wrecked all that is taken from
it belongs to the treasury. At Qaliqup, however, it is retained

815
 SOUTH INDIA

by its owners, and for that reason Qaliqup has become a

98 flourishing and much frequented city. When those on the
kakam saw what had happened to the junk they spread their
sails and went off, with all my goods and slave-boys and slave-
girls on board, leaving me alone on the beach with but one
slave whom I had enfranchised. When he saw what had be-
fallen me he deserted me, and I had nothing left with me at all
except the ten dinars that the jug? had given me and the carpet
I had used to spread out.
As I was told that the kakam would have to put in at the port
of Kawlam, 44 I decided to travel thither, it being a ten days'
journey either by land or by the river, if anyone prefers that
route. 45 I set out therefore by the river, and hired one of the
Muslims to carry the carpet for me. Their custom when travel-
ling on that river is to disembark in the evening and pass the
night in the villages on its banks, returning to the boat in the
99 morning. | We used to do this too. There was no Muslim on
the boat except the man I had hired, and he used to drink
wine with the infidels when we went ashore and annoy me
with his brawling, which made things all the worse for me. On
the fifth day of our journey we came to KunjI-Kari, which is on
top of a hill there; 46 it is inhabited by Jews, who have one of
their own number as their governor, and pay a poll-tax to the
Sultan of Kawlam.
Account of the cinnamon and brazil trees. All the trees along this
river are cinnamon and brazil trees. They use them for fire-
wood in these parts and we used to light fires with them to
cook our food on this journey.
On the tenth day we reached the city of Kawlam [Quilon],
one of the finest towns in the Mulaibar lands. It has fine
100 bazaars, and its merchants are called $ul!s. 47 | They are

44 Quilon.
45 It is not possible to make the entire journey by inland waterways.
46 On the Jewish communities in Kerala, see J. B. Segal, A History of the Jews of
Cochin, London, 1993. Professor Segal writes: 'Kunjakari has been plausibly
identified with the section of the river called Kanjirapuzha to the east of the island
of Chennamangalam where there was a very old Jewish settlement' (p. 10).
47 <Chulia is a name given in Ceylon and in Malabar to a particular class of
Mahommedans, and sometimes to Mahommedans generally. There is much
obscurity about the origin and proper application of the term' (Hobson-Jobson, s.v.
Ghoolia).

816
 KAWLAM

immensely wealthy; a single merchant will buy a vessel with

all that is in it and load it with goods from his own house.
There is a colony of Muslim merchants there, the chief of
whom is 'Ala' al-Din al-Awaji, from Awa in al-e!raq. 4H He is
a Rafi^T, 49 and has a number of associates belonging to his
sect, and they proclaim it openly. The qao!i of the town is a
worthy man from Qazwin, and the head of the Muslim com-
munity there is Muhammad Shahbandar, who has a worthy
and open-handed brother named TaqI al-Din. The cathedral
mosque is a magnificent building, constructed by the mer-
chant Khwaja Muhadhdhab. This city is the nearest of the
Mulaibar towns to China and it is to it that most of the
merchants [from China] come. Muslims are honoured and
respected there.
Account of its Sultan. The Sultan of Kawlam is an infidel called
Tlrawari; 50 | he respects the Muslims and he judges severely 101
thieves and profligates.
Anecdote. Amongst the events which I witnessed at Kawlam
was the following. One of the Iraqi archers killed another and
then fled to the house of al-Awaji. He was a man of consider-
able wealth, and when the Muslims wished to bury the mur-
dered man the Sultan's officers stopped them saying: 'He
cannot be buried until you deliver his murderer to us that he
may be put to death for him.' They left him in his coffin at al-
AwajT's gate until he stank and decomposed, whereupon al-
AwajT gave them possession of the murderer and desired them
to let him go alive in return for surrendering his properties to
them. But they refused to accept this and put him to death
and thereafter the murdered man was buried. |
Anecdote. I was told that the Sultan of Kawlam rode out into 102
the environs of the town one day. His road lay between the
orchards, and he had with him his son-in-law, his daughter's
husband, one of the sons of the maliks. This man picked up a
mango which had fallen from one of the orchards. The Sultan

48 Aveh in Persia.
49 I.e. Turncoats, a pejorative word applied to some Shfls, and on occasion to
ShfIs in general. The Muslims of Kerala are now Sunnis, but names like the
Karbala' Maidan in Quilon may indicate the presence of a Shfl community in
the past.
50 A title, perhaps meaning 'sacred lord', rather than a personal name.

817
 SOUTH INDIA

was watching him and gave orders that he should be cut in two
on the spot. He was divided into two halves and each half was
put on a cross on the right and on the left of the road and the
mango also was cut in two, one half of it being placed above
each half of him, and he was left there as an example to the
beholders.
Anecdote. There was an incident of the same kind at Qaliqup,
when the brother's son of the Sultan's deputy forcibly seized a
sword belonging to one of the Muslim merchants. The mer-
103 chant laid a complaint before his uncle | who promised him to
investigate his case. He sat down at the gate of his house; and
by-and-bye his nephew appeared wearing that sword, where-
upon he called him and said: 'This is the sword of the Mus-
lim.' He replied: 'Yes.' He said: 'Did you buy it from him?',
and when his nephew said 'No' he bade his guards seize him,
and then gave orders that he should be executed with that
very sword.
I stayed at Kawlam for some time in the hospice of the shaikh
Fakhr al-Din, son of the shaikh Shihab al-Din of Kazarun,
the shaikh of the hospice of Qaliqup, 51 but heard no news of
the kakam. During my stay there the ambassadors from the
king of China who had been with us arrived there also. They
had embarked on one of the junks which was wrecked like
the others. The Chinese merchants provided them with
clothes and they returned to China, where I met them again
later.
I intended at first to return from Kawlam to the Sultan to
104 tell him what | had happened to the present, but afterwards I
was afraid that he would find fault with what I had done and
ask me why I had not stayed with the present. I determined
therefore to return to Sultan Jamal al-Din of Hinawr and stay
with him until I should obtain news of the kakam. So I went
back to Qaliqup and found there a vessel belonging to the
Sultan [of India], on which he had despatched an Arab amir
known as the sayyid Abu'l-tfasan. He was one of the bard-
dars, that is the private door-keepers, 52 whom the Sultan had
despatched with sums of money with which to enlist in his

51 See above, p. 812.

52 For Persian pardehdar, a chamberlain.

818
 EXPEDITION AGAINST SANDABUR

service all whom he could of the Arabs from the land of

Hurmuz and al-Qa;If, 53 because of his affection for the Arabs.
I went to visit this amir and found him decided to winter at
Qaliqut, after which he would continue his journey to the land
of the Arabs. I asked him to advise me about returning to the
Sultan and he did not support this suggestion, so I travelled
with him in his ship from Qaliqut. It was then the end of the
season for voyaging, | and we used to sail only during the first ios
half of the day, then anchor until the next day. We met four
fighting vessels on our way and were afraid of them but after
all they did us no harm. On reaching Hinawr, I went ashore to
visit the Sultan and saluted him; he assigned me a lodging,
but without a servant, and asked me to recite the prayers with
him. I spent most of my time in his mosque and used to read
the Qur'an through every day, and later twice a day, begin-
ning the first recital after the dawn prayer and ending it in the
early afternoon, then after making fresh ablutions I would
begin the second recital and end it about sunset. I continued
to do this for the space of three months, during which I went
into retreat for forty days. |
Account of our going out on an expedition and conquest ofSanddbur. 106
Sultan Jamal al-Dln had fitted out fifty-two vessels for an
expedition to attack Sandabur [Goa]. A quarrel had broken out
there between the Sultan and his son, and the latter had
written to Jamal al-Dln inviting him to seize the town and
promising to accept Islam and marry his sister. When the ships
were made ready it occurred to me to set out with them to the
Holy War, so I opened the Qur'an to take an augury, and
found at the top of the page: 7» them is the name of God
frequently mentioned, and verily God will aid those who aid Him. >54
I took this as a good omen, and when the Sultan came for the
afternoon prayer I said to him: 'I wish to join the expedition.'
'In that case', he replied, 'you will be their commander.' I
related to him the incident of my augury from the Qur'an,
which so delighted him that he resolved to join the expedition
| himself, though previously he had not intended to do so. He 10?
embarked on one of the vessels, I being with him, on a

53 See II, p. 410 and n. 145, where I.E. specifies the unusual spelling al-Qujaif.
54 Qur'an, sura xxii, 40.

819
 SOUTH INDIA

Saturday, and we reached Sandabur on the Monday evening.

When we entered its bay, we found its inhabitants prepared
for the battle, with mangonels already set up. So we spent that
night near the place, and on the next morning, when the
drums, trumpets and bugles were sounded, the vessels moved
in to the attack, and the defenders bombarded them with the
mangonels. I saw a stone hit one of the men who was standing
close to the Sultan. The men on the ships jumped into the
water, shields and sword in hand, and the Sultan went down
into an 'ukairi, which is like a shilltr. ss I too jumped into the
water with the rest of the men. We had with us two tartans,
open at the stern, carrying horses; they are so constructed that
the horseman mounts his horse inside the vessel, puts on his
108 armour and comes out. | They did this and God permitted its
conquest and sent down victory to the Muslims. We entered
the city at the point of the sword and the greater part of the
infidels took refuge in their Sultan's palace, but when we set
fire to it they came out and we seized them. The Sultan
thereafter gave them quarter and restored their wives and
children to them. They were about ten thousand in number
and he assigned to them as residence a suburb of the town and
himself occupied the palace, giving the houses in its neigh-
bourhood to his courtiers. He gave me a Marhata (?) slave-girl
called Lamkl -1 called her Mubaraka, and when her husband
wished to ransom her I refused - and also gave me ^farajiya^
of Egyptian manufacture which was found in the treasuries of
the infidel.
I stayed with him at Sandabur from the day of its capture,
which was the 13th of Jumada I, until the middle of Sha'ban; 57
I then asked him for permission to travel and he made me
109 promise to return to him. So I sailed | to Hinawr, continued
thence to Fakanur, Manjarur, Hill, Jurfattan, Dahfattan, Bud-
fattan, Fandarayna and Qaliqut - all of which places have
been mentioned above - and finally to al-Shaliyat, a most
beautiful town, in which the fabrics called by its name are

55 Dozy (Supplement, s.v.) defines 'ukairi as 'sorte de grande galere' and

shilRr as 'espece de barque'; the boat in question was evidently of shallow
draught.
56 An ample robe to wear over other clothing.
57 I.e. from 15 October 1342 to mid January 1343.

820
 SANDABUR BESIEGED

manufactured. 58 After a long stay in this town I returned to

Qaliqup. Two slaves who had been with me on the kakam
arrived at Qaliqup and told me that the slave-girl who had been
pregnant, and on whose account I was much upset, had died,
and that the ruler of Jawa had taken the rest of my slave-girls,
that my goods had been seized by various hands, and that my
companions were scattered to China, Jawa and Bengal. On
hearing this I returned to Hinawr and thence to Sandabur,
reaching it at the end of Muharram, and I stayed there until
the2ndofRabfII. 59
The infidel Sultan of Sandabur, | from whom we had cap-no
tured the town, now advanced to recapture it. All the infidels
fled to join him, and the Sultan's troops, who were dispersed
in the [outlying] villages, abandoned us. We were besieged by
the infidels and reduced to great straits. When the situation
became serious, I left the town during the siege and returned
to Qaliqut, where I decided to travel to Dhlbat al-Mahal, of
which I had heard.

58 Chaliyam, opposite Beypuron the south side of the river of that name. Many
fabrics of different kinds were made there, and there are many kinds with names
recalling the place, but their precise identity has not been established (Hobson-
Jobson, s.v. Chalia, and Mzik, p. 314, n. 102).
59 I.e. from 24 June to 24 August 1343. These dates cannot be reconciled with
his statement (below, p. 846) that he left the Maldives on 26 August 1344.

821
 CHAPTER XVII

The Maldives
en days after embarking at Qaliqup we reached the

T islands of Dhlbat al-Mahal [the Maldives] (Dhlba being

pronounced like the feminine of dhib). 2 These islands
are one of the wonders of the world and number about two
thousand in all. 3 Each hundred or less of them form a circular
cluster resembling a ring, this ring having one entrance like a
gateway, and only through this entrance can ships reach the
islands. 4 When a vessel arrives at any one of them it must
111 needs take one of the inhabitants j to pilot it to the other
islands. They are so close-set that on leaving one island the
tops of the palms on another are visible. If a ship loses its
course it is unable to enter and is carried by the wind to al-
Ma'bar or to Ceylon.
The inhabitants of the Maldives are all of them Muslims,
pious and upright. The islands are divided into twelve dis-
tricts, each under a governor whom they call the kardui?

1 I.B.'s description of the Maldives is of great interest, being far more detailed
than any earlier surviving account. Early notices of the islands, including I.B.'s,
were collected and translated by Albert Gray, assisted by H. C. P. Bell, in
Appendix A to their translation of the narrative of Francois Pyrard of Laval,
published by the Hakluyt Society, 1887-90. In the notes to this chapter their
spellings of Maldivian words have been adopted except that long vowels have
been indicated by a macron instead of an acute accent. I am grateful to Mr C. H.
B. Reynolds (hereafter C.H.B.R.) for much help with some of the notes to this
and the following chapter.
2 Dhfb is the Arabic word for a wolf, or, in Africa, a jackal; dhtbat is from
Sanskrit dvipa 'island'.
3 The number of islands has been variously estimated, some being mere
sandbanks which may be temporarily submerged; rather more than 200 are
inhabited.
4 The islands are coral atolls raised on a submarine ridge.
5 'The Divehi (Maldivian) word is karuda-veri, an old equivalent of the modern
a/oju-veri or atoll chief (C.H.B.R.).

822
 MALDIVIAN FOOD

Amongst the districts are Palipur, Kannalus, Mahal (which has

given its name to the whole archipelago, and in which is the
residence of their Sultans), Taladlb, Karaydu, Al-Taim, Tala-
dummatl, | HaladummatT, Baraidu, Kandakal, Muluk, and 112
Suwaid, which is the most remote of them. 6 There is no
agriculture at all on any of the islands, except that a cereal
resembling anly1 is grown in the district of Suwaid and carried
thence to Mahal. The inhabitants live on a fish resembling the
lirun? which they call qulb al-mas? it has red flesh and no
grease, and smells like mutton. On catching it, they cut the
fish in four, cook it lightly, then smoke it in palm-leaf baskets.
When it is quite dry, they eat it. Some of these fish are
exported to India, China and al-Yaman. |
Description of their trees. Most of the trees on these islands are 113
coco-palms, and they provide food for the inhabitants along
with fish. We have already spoken of the coco-palm. These
trees are quite extraordinary; each palm bears twelve bunches
a year, one coming out every month; some are small, some
large, some dry and some green, it is always so. They make
milk, oil and honey from it, as we have related in the first
journey. From its honey they make sweetmeats which they
eat along with the dried coconut. All these products of the
coco-palm and the fish which they live on have an amazing
and unparalleled effect in sexual intercourse, and the people
of these islands perform wonders in this respect. I had there

6 Gray and Bell identified these as Fadiffolu, Kinalos, Male, NilandG, Karhidu,
Utimu, Tiladummati, Haddumati, Falidu, Kedlkolu, Muiaku, and Suadiva: The
Voyage of Francois Pyrard, II, p. 457, n. 3. These are all atolls except Karhidu,
Utimu and KedTkolu, which are islands; they suggest that I.B. used the name of
the most important island for the whole atoll. They see his Taladlb as a copyist's
error for Niladib, itself standing for Nilandu. They also note that Utimu island is
in Tiladummati atoll, which is listed separately. I.B. later states (pp. 833-4) that
he landed in Kannalus and then sailed by way of al-Taim to Male. They remark
that this would be a circuitous route, Utimu lying well to the north of Kinalos and
Male to the south. However, I.B. did not hire his own vessel but took ship with
someone who may well have had reasons of his own for going to Utimu.
7 A Berber word for a small-grained millet. In West Africa I.B. probably refers
to Pennisetum typhoideum, here to Panicum miliaceum or Setaria italica both of which
grow in the southern atolls.
8 D. and S. read lirun but note that MS Bib. Nat. 910 reads /. birun, which is
certainly the better reading, representing the Berber word for the tunny fish. See
E. Destaing, Vocabulairefran^ais-berbere, Paris, 1935, under poisson and than.
9 Maldivian kalu Hit mas, i.e. black bonito, Scomberpelamis L.

823
 THE MALDIVES

myself four wives, and concubines as well, and I used to visit

114 all of them every day and pass the night with | the wife whose
turn it was, and this I continued to do the whole year and a
half that I was there.
Among their trees also are thejamun, 10 the citron, orange
and colocasia.' ! From the roots of this last they grind a flour,
with which they make vermicelli, and they cook this in the
milk of the coconut. This is one of the most delicious dishes;
I was very fond of it, and used to eat it often.
Account of the people of these islands, and of some of their customs,
and description of their dwellings. The people of these islands are
upright and pious, sound in belief, and sincere in purpose;
they keep to lawful foods, and their prayers are answered.
When one of them sees a man he says to him: 4God is my Lord
and Muhammad my Prophet, and I am an ignorant and miser-
able creature.' Their bodies are weak, they are unused to
fighting and warfare, and their armour is prayer. Once when I
115 ordered | a thief s hand to be cut off, a number of those who
were in the room fainted. The Indian pirates do not raid or
molest them, as they have learned from experience that any-
one who seizes anything from them speedily meets misfor-
tune. When the enemies' ships come this way, they seize any
whom they find other than the natives, but do not offer any
injury to any of the latter. If one of the idolaters takes but a
single lemon, the chief of the infidels punishes him and beats
him severely through fear of the consequences of that action.
Were it not for this they would be the easiest prey for those
who should come to fight them because of the weakness of
their physique. In each island of theirs there are beautiful
mosques, and most of their buildings are made of wood. They
are very cleanly and avoid filth; most of them bathe twice a
day to cleanse themselves, because of the extreme heat there
and their profuse perspiration. They make plentiful use of |
lie perfumed oils, such as oil of sandalwood, and they smear
themselves withg6a/iya brought from Maqdashaw. 12 It is their
custom when they have prayed the dawn prayer that every
10 Eugenia jambolana.
11 The reference is to Dioscorea oppositifolia, Maldivian hittala, not to a coloca-
sia.
12 A perfume of musk and ambergris.

824
 MALDIVIAN CUSTOMS AND HOUSES

woman comes to her husband or her son, bringing the anti-

mony jar, rose water and gAa/iya; she then paints his eyes with
the antimony so that his skin shines and the traces of fatigue
are removed from his face. Their garments are simply aprons;
they tie one round their waists in place of trousers, and on
their backs they place cloths called al-wilydn, resembling the
ihrdm garments. 13 Some wear a turban, others a small kerchief
instead. When any of them meets the qap1! or preacher, he
removes his cloth from his shoulders, uncovering his back,
and accompanies him thus to his house. |
It is one of their customs that when one of their men marries 117
and goes to his wife's house, cotton cloths are spread on the
ground for him from the outer door of her house to her chamber,
and on them, to right and to left of his way to the chamber, are
placed handfuls of cowries. The woman is standing at the door
of her apartment awaiting him, and when he comes to her she
throws over his feet a garment, which is taken by his servants.
Should it be the woman who goes to the man's place of
residence, his house is carpeted in the same way with cowries
placed on the cloths, and when she reaches him the woman
throws the garment over his feet. 14 The same custom is
observed by them in saluting the Sultan; each one must throw
a garment on that occasion, as we shall describe later.
Their buildings are of wood and they raise the floors of their
houses high above the ground as a protection from the damp,
for their soil is humid. Their procedure in doing so is | to cut us
stones, each of them two or three cubits long, and lay them in
rows, and to place upon these transversely planks of coco-
palms, and then make the walls of planks. They show a
remarkable skill in this. In the vestibule of the house is a room
which they call the malam, where the owner sits with his
friends. 15 This malam has two doors, one of them opening on
the vestibule, by which his visitors come in. At the entrance to

13 Gray and Bell suggest that this is probably a corruption of Ma\divian ff/iya,
waist cloth. The ijram refers to the seamless garments worn by pilgrims at Mecca.
14 Evidently at this time two kinds of marriage practised in Ceylon were also
prevalent in the Maldives. In one the groom went to the bride's house, which
became the marital home and remained her property; in the other the bride went
to the groom's house and the situation was reversed.
15 Not identified. 'Reception rooms are currently called aff (C.H.B.R.).

825
 THE MALDIVES

this room is a jar filled with water and a scoop of coconut shell
which they call walanj, with a handle two cubits long. 16 They
use this scoop to draw water from the wells because of their
shallowness. All of them high or low, are bare-footed; their
lanes are kept swept and clean and are shaded by trees, so that
119 to walk in them is like walking in an orchard. In spite of that,
every person entering a house must wash his feet with water
from the jar kept at the entrance to the mdlam, and wipe them
with a rough towel of fibre matting which he finds there, after
which he enters the room. The same practice is followed on
entering a mosque.
It is a custom of theirs when a vessel arrives at their island
that kanddir, that is to say small boats, go out to meet them, 17
loaded with people from the island carrying betel and karan-
bah, that is green coconuts. 18 Each man of them gives these to
anyone whom he chooses on board the vessel, and that person
becomes his guest and carries his goods to his host's house as
though he were one of his relatives. Any of the visitors who
wishes to marry may do so, but when it is time for him to leave
he divorces the woman, because their women never leave the
country. If a visitor does not marry, the woman in the house
120where he lodges | cooks for him, serves him and gives him
provisions when he sets out on his journey. In return for that
she is content to receive from him the smallest pittance of
charity. The profit of the treasury (which they call the
bandar) 19 consists in its purchase at a fixed rate of a proportion
of every kind of merchandise in the vessel, whether the goods
are worth that or more than that; they call this the 'right of the
bandar3 . In every island there is a bandar house made of wood,
which they call the bajan$dr, z* and in which the governor, who
is called the kardun^ stores all the goods, and buys and sells

16 'There is a Sinhalese word valanda or vaianj, meaning a cooking vessel... A

well-scoop is now called dan? (G.H.B.R.).
17 An Arabic plural of kundura. 'The word is, or was, used in Sinhalese for a
Maldivian boat, but not, as far as I am aware, in Maldivian ... The normal
Maldivian word for a sailing boat is 0$ or donf (C.H.B.R.).
18 Maldivian kurunbd.
19 Sanskrit bhdnddra, 'storehouse', 'treasury', which I.E. has confused with
Persian bandar, 'port'. (Mzik, p. 295, n. 75.)
20 ?orbangasar(Hobson-Jobson y s.v. Bankshall).
21 Previously written kardui, p. 822.

826
 COWRIES AS CURRENCY

with them. The people buy pottery, when it is brought to

them, with chickens, so that a cooking pot is sold amongst
them for five or six chickens.
From these islands there are exported by ship the fish we
have mentioned, coconuts, waist cloths, wilydn, and cotton
turbans, as well as brass utensils, of which they have a great
many, | cowrie shells and qanbar. zz This is the hairy integu-121
ment of the coconut, which they tan in pits on the shore, and
afterwards beat out with bars; the women then spin it and it is
made into cords for sewing [the planks of] ships together.
These cords are exported to India, China, and al-Yaman, and
are better than hemp. The Indian and Yemenite ships are
sewn together with them, for that sea is full of reefs, and if a
ship is nailed with iron nails it breaks up on striking the rocks,
whereas if it is sewn together with cords, it is given a certain
resilience and does not fall to pieces.
The inhabitants of these islands use cowrie shells as money.
This is an animal which they gather in the sea and put into pits
there where its flesh disappears, leaving its white shell. They
call a hundred of these by the name of siydh, and seven
hundred by the name of fdl, \ twelve thousand kuttd and a 122
hundred thousand bustu. 23 They buy and sell with these at the
rate of four bustus for a gold dinar, but they often fall in value
to ten bustus for a dinar. They sell them in exchange for rice to
the people of Bengal, who also use them as money, as well as
to the Yemenites, who use them instead of sand [as ballast] in
their ships. These cowries are used also by the negroes in their
lands; I saw them being sold at Mall! and Gawgaw at the rate
of 1,150 for a dinar. 24
Account of their women. Their womenfolk do not cover their
heads, not even at one side. | Most of them wear only one 123
apron from the navel to the ground, the rest of their bodies
being uncovered. It is thus that they walk abroad in the
bazaars and elsewhere. When I was qadl there, I tried to put
an end to this practice and ordered them to wear clothes, but
I met with no success. No woman was admitted to my pre-
sence in a lawsuit unless her body was covered, but apart from
22 The Arabic form of the Tamil kayiru (HobsonJobson, s.v. 'Coir).
23 Maldivian Aiya,fa/e, kottewnd basta.
24 Mali and Gao, which I.B. visited in West Africa.

827
 THE MALDIVES

that I was unable to effect anything. 25 Some of them wear

shirts in addition to the waistcloth, their shirts having short
and wide sleeves. I had some slave-girls who wore garments
like those worn at Dihli and who covered their heads, but it
was more of a disfigurement than an ornament in their case,
since they were not accustomed to it.
The women's ornaments consist of bracelets, of which each
woman wears so many on her forearm as to cover the arm from
wrist-bone to elbow. They are made of silver, and no one wears
124 bracelets of gold | except the Sultan's wives and relatives.
They wear anklets also, which they call bayil, Zh and necklaces
of gold on their chests, and these they call basdarad. 21 A
singular custom amongst them is to hire themselves out as
servants in houses at a fixed wage of five dinars or less, their
employer being responsible for their upkeep; they do not look
upon this as dishonourable, and most of their girls do so. You
will find ten or twenty of them in a rich man's house. Every
utensil that a girl breaks is charged up against her. When she
wishes to transfer from one house to another, her new employ-
ers give her the sum which she owes to her former employers;
she pays this to the latter and remains so much in debt to her
125 new employers. The chief occupation of these | hired women
is spinning qanbar.
It is easy to get married in these islands on account of the
smallness of the dowries and the pleasure of their women's
society. The majority of people do not specify a dowry; only
the act is witnessed and a wedding gift conformable to the
bride's station is given. When ships arrive the crews marry
wives and when they want to sail they divorce them; it is really
a sort of temporary marriage, and the women never leave their
country. I have never found in the world any women more
agreeable to consort with than they are. Amongst these people
the woman never entrusts the service of her husband to any-
one but herself; it is she who brings him his food and removes
it from his presence, who washes his hand and brings him the

25 By the time of Pyrard's stay in the Maldives female dress approximated to

I.B's minimum requirements.
26
Mr Reynolds suggests that, as Maldivian formerly used/) where it now has/,
there might have been a word like pat a/a, which could mean 'worn on the feet'.
27 Not identified.

828
 CONVERSION OF THE MALDIVES TO ISLAM

water for his ablutions, and who covers his feet when he
sleeps. It is one of their customs that the woman does not eat
with her husband, nor does the man even know what she eats.
I married several women there, and some of them ate with me
after some effort on my part, | but some of them never did so, 126
nor was I able to see them eating and no ruse of mine for this
purpose succeeded.
Account of the reason for the conversion to Islam of the inhabitants of
these islands and of the evil spirits of the jinn which used to do injury
to them every month. A number of trustworthy persons among
the population such as the jurist elsa of al-Yaman, the jurist
and teacher eAH, the qatfi 'Abdallah and others told me that
these islanders were infidels28 and that every month there
would appear to them an evil spirit of the jinn, coming from
the direction of the sea and resembling a ship filled with
lights. On seeing him it was their custom to take a virgin girl
and, after dressing her in finery, to conduct her to the
Budkhdnah, 2* that is the idol-temple, which was built on the
seashore and had a window looking out on the sea. There they
would leave her for a night and when they came back in the 12?
morning they would find her violated and dead. So they went
on drawing lots every month amongst themselves, and the one
on whom the lot fell gave up his daughter. Then there came
amongst them a man from the Maghrib called Abu'1 Barakat
al-Barbari, who could recite by heart the Holy Qur'an, and he
lodged in the house of an old woman of their people in the
island of Mahal. One day when he visited her he found that
she had called together all her kinswomen and they were
weeping as though they were at a funeral ceremony. He asked
them what was the matter with them but they did not explain
it to him. Then an interpreter came and told him that the lot
had fallen on the old woman, and she had but one daughter
whom the evil spirit would kill. Abu'1 Barakat said to her: 'I
shall go in place of your daughter tonight', for he was beard-
less, having no hair at all on his face. So they took him that
night and brought him into the Rudkhanah, he having pre-
viously made his ablutions, and he stayed there reciting the

28 The Maldivians were formerly Buddhists.

29 Persian. Bud, from Buddha, is widely used in Islamic languages for an idol.

829
 THE MALDIVES

Qur'an. Then the evil spirit appeared to him from the window
but he continued his recitation and when the spirit came so
128 near as to hear the recital | he plunged into the sea. In the
morning the Maghribl was still occupied in his recitation when
the old woman came with her kinsfolk and the people of the
island to bring out the girl, as they had been accustomed to
do, and burn her body. They found the Maghrib! reciting,
took him to their king who was called Shanuraza, and told the
latter his story. The king was astonished at it and when the
Maghrib! expounded Islam to him and interested him in it he
replied: 'Stay with us until the next month; then if you repeat
this action and escape the evil spirit I shall become a Muslim.'
So he stayed with them and God opened the breast of the king
to Islam and he was converted before the end of the month,
and his children and his court also. 30
When the next month opened the Maghribl was taken to
the Budkhdnah, but the demon did not come; he continued to
recite the Qur'an till dawn, and when the Sultan came along
with the people and found him occupied in recitation they
129 broke up the idols and destroyed the Budkhdnah. The popu-
lation of the island embraced Islam and sent word to all the
other islands, whose populations were converted also. The
Maghribi settled down among them, greatly venerated, and
they adopted his rite, namely the rite of the Imam Malik, may
God be pleased with him, 31 and to this day they continue to
hold the Maghribis in high respect because of him. He built a

30 There is confusion about the conversion of the Maldives to Islam. The

Ta'rikh, the history of the islands from then to 1821, is accessible only in Bell's
abridged translation. It ascribes the conversion to miracles performed by Shaikh
Yusuf Shams al-Dln of Tabriz and gives the date as 12 RabfH 548, i.e. July
1153. A wooden inscription in Arabic from the Hukuru Miskit, the Friday
mosque, in Male attributes the conversion to Abu'1 Barakat Yusuf of Tabriz and
gives the same year and month. Confusion between BarbarT and Tabriz! would
not be inconceivable in Arabic MSS. (Andrew D. W. Forbes, 'The Mosque in the
Maldive Islands; a Preliminary Historical Survey', Arrhipel, 26, 1983, where a
photograph of the inscription is reproduced.) No Maldivian Sultan named Shanur-
aza is recorded. The inscription in the Hukuru Miskit refers to the role of the
Wazlr Shanfiraz 'All ibn Abi'l Faraj al-Salah! in the reconstruction of the mosque
in 738/1338. Mr Reynolds reads the name as Shanaviraza and connects it with
the Sinhalese senevirajd, 'Commander-in-chief. The first Muslim Sultan was
Muhammad al-'Adil, 'the just'.
31 As Mr Forbes has noted, if Abu'1 Barakat came from the Maghrib and not
from Tabriz it is probable that he was a Malik!.

830
 SULTANA KHADIJA

mosque which is known by his name and I read the following

words on the grille (maq$uraK) of the cathedral mosque carved
in wood: 'The Sultan Afomad Shanuraza accepted Islam at the
hand of Abu'1 Barakat al-Barbari al-Maghribl.'32 This Sultan
assigned the third of the tax receipts of the islands as alms for
travellers, since it was through them that his conversion to
Islam had happened, and for that reason his name is remem-
bered to the present day.
On account of that demon many of these islands were
uninhabited before the introduction of Islam. When we came
to them I was still ignorant of this event. One night when I was
engaged in some business or other I heard the people shouting
tahttls and ta&tirs3* and saw the boys carrying copies of the 130
Qur'an on their heads and the women beating on basins and
copper utensils. Greatly astonished at all this I asked what was
afoot and they said: 'Just look out to sea', so I looked and there
was something like a great ship which seemed as though it were
full of lamps and torches. They said: 'That is the demon, whose
habit it is to appear once a month, but when we do what you
have seen he goes away without doing any harm to us.'
Account of the Sultana of these islands. It is a strange thing about
these islands that their ruler is a woman, Khadija, daughter of
the Sultan Jalal al-Dln eOmar, son of the Sultan $alah al-Dln
$alih of Bengal. The sovereignty belonged to her grandfather,
then to her father, and after his death to her brother Shihab al-
Dln, who was a minor. The Wazir 'Abdallah b. Muhammad
of Hao!ramaut married | his mother and took control of him.
This is the same 'Abdallah who married also the present 131
Sultana Khadija after the death of her [first] husband, the
Wazir Jamal al-Dln, as we shall relate. When Shihab al-Dln
came to manhood he drove out his father-in-law, the Wazir
'Abdallah, exiled him to the islands of al-Suwaid and ruled
as sole sovereign. 34 As Wazir he appointed one of his depen-
dants [mawall] named CA1I Kalaki, 35 whom he afterwards
32 This may be the inscription published by Mr Forbes despite the discrepan-
cies. The reigning Sultan at the time of I.B.'s visit was Ahmad Shihab al-DTn.
33 The formulas 'There is no God but God' and 'God is most great*.
34 I.B.'s narrative is confirmed by the Ta'riM except that Salah al-Dln of Bengal
is not named, Jalal al-DTn 'Omar is called Umaru-vlru and KhadTja is called
Rehendi Kambadikilage.
35 Kilage, a Maldivian title implying authority, Pyrard's Qui/ague.

831
 THE MALDIVES

removed from office three years later and exiled also to al-
Suwaid. It is told of this Sultan Shihab ad-Din that he used to
frequent the wives of his nobles and chief courtiers at night,
on account of which they deposed him, exiled him to the
region of HaladutanI, 56 and sent someone there who killed
him.
None of the royal house was now left but his sisters Khadlja
the eldest, and Maryam and Fafima, so they raised Khadlja to
the throne. She was married to their preacher, 37 and promoted
132 his son | Muhammad to the office of preacher in his place, but
orders are executed in her name only. They write the orders
on palm leaves with a curved iron instrument resembling a
knife; they write nothing on paper but copies of the Qur'an
and works of theology. The preacher mentions her name at
the Friday prayer and on other occasions, saying: 'Oh God aid
Thy maidservant whom Thou hast chosen in Thy knowledge
of the world, and hast made her a mercy for the whole people
of the Muslims, that is, this Sultana Khadlja, daughter of the
Sultan Jalal ad-Din, son of the Sultan $alah al-Dln.'
When a stranger comes to the islands and visits the
audience-hall which they call the ddr** custom demands that
he take two pieces of cloth with him. He makes obeisance
towards this Sultana, and throws down one of these cloths,
then to her Wazir, who is her husband Jamal al-Dln, and
throws down the other. Her army comprises about a thousand
men, recruited from abroad, though some are natives. They
133 come to the ddr every day, | make obeisance and retire, and
their pay consists of rice, which is issued to them from the
bandar every month. At the end of each month they come to
the ddr, make obeisance and say to the Wazir: 'Transmit our
homage and make it known that we have come for our pay',
whereupon orders are given for it to be issued to them. The
qatfi and the officials, whom they call Wazlrs, also present
their homage daily at the ddr and after the eunuchs have
transmitted it they withdraw.

36 Haddummati.
37 The office of katibu in Male was one of great dignity (Pyrard, I, pp. 131-3).
The Maldivian word, Pyrard's Catibe, represents Arabic khatfb, 'preacher', not, as
Gray and Bell supposed (Pyrard, I, p. 70, n. 2) katib, 'scribe'.
38 Arabic dar, 'house'.

832
 MALDIVIAN OFFICIALS

Account of the officials and their comportment. These people call

the principal Wazlr, the Sultan's deputy, by the name of
Kalakt, and the judge Fandaydrqdlu** All their judgments are
referred to the qao1!; he is held in greater respect among the
people than anyone else; | his orders are obeyed as those of 134
the ruler or even more so. He sits on a carpet in the ddr, and
enjoys the entire revenue of three islands, according to an
ancient custom, established by the Sultan Atimad ShanQraza.
They call the preacher Handijari, the chancery officer [safcib
al-dlwan] Fdmalddri, the finance officer Mdfdkalu, the police
commandant Fitndyak; and naval commander Mdndyak.** All
these persons have the title of Wazir. There is no prison in
these islands; criminals are confined in wooden chambers
intended for merchandise, and each of them is secured by a
piece of wood, as is done amongst us [in Morocco] with
Christian prisoners. | 135
Account of my arrival at these islands and of the course of my fortune
there. When I arrived at these islands I disembarked at the one
called Kannalus, a fine island containing many mosques, and I
put up at the house of one of the pious persons there. I was
hospitably entertained by the jurist eAH, a worthy man who
has sons engaged in religious studies. On this island I met a
man called Muhammad, belonging to Zafar al-Humu^,41 who
showed me hospitality and told me that if I entered the island
of Mahal the Wazir would detain me there, because they had
no qao!l. Now my design was to sail from there to Ma'bar,
Sarandlb, and Bengal, and thence on to China. I had come to
the islands in the vessel of the captain 'Omar of Hinawr, a
worthy man and a pilgrim, and when we reached Kannalus he
stayed there for ten days, and then hired a kundura to go to
Mahal with a present for the Sultana | and her husband. I
wanted to go with him, but he said: 'the kundura has no room 136

39 Fadiyaru Kaloge-fanu, Pyrard's Pandiare.

40 Other authorities give lists of the principal ministers in which some of these
words appear, though not necessarily with the same meaning. Handyarfis Bell's
hadegiri, designating 'chief treasurer'. Fama/darfis Pyrard's Pammedery, which Bell
takes to be Fdmuderi, for Pyrard a great lord but not a minister. Mdfakalu is Pyrard's
Manpas, Bell's Mafai, 'chancellor'. Mzik connects Fitndyak with Sanskrit ndyaka
'commander' and Manayak with Sanskrit mahdndyaka, 'grand commander'. They
are discussed in a long note in The Voyage of Francois Pyrard, I, pp. 210-13.
41 See vol. II, p. 382, n. 68.

833
 THE MALDIVES

for you and your companions, but if you wish to come by

yourself without them it is up to you.' I refused to do this and
he set out, but the wind played tricks with him and four days
later he returned to us, sorely tried. He then made his excuses
to me and insisted that I should go with him and take my
companions. We used to set sail in the morning and disembark
at midday on one of the islands, then set off | again and spend
the night on another. After four days we reached the district of
al-Taim; the kardut there was called Hilal and he made his
salutations to me and entertained me. He came to visit me
accompanied by four men, two of whom carried four fowls
suspended from a staff across their shoulders, and the other
two about ten coconuts suspended from a similar staff. I was
surprised at the importance they gave to this miserable affair
137 but I was told that they had done it | by way of showing
honour and respect.
After leaving them we disembarked on the sixth day on the
island of eOthman, a worthy man, one of the best of men,
who received us honourably and showed us hospitality, and on
the eighth day we disembarked on an island belonging to a
Wazlr called al-Talamdl. On the tenth day we arrived at the
island of Mahal, the seat of the Sultana and her husband and
anchored in its harbour. The custom of the islanders is that no
one may go ashore without their permission. When permission
was given to us to disembark I wished to repair to one of the
mosques, but the attendants on shore prevented me, saying
that I must visit the Wazir. I had previously enjoined the
captain of the ship to say, if he were asked about me: 'I do not
know him', fearing that I should be detained by them, and I
was ignorant of the fact that some gossip had written to them
telling them about me and that I had been qac-I at DihlT. On
reaching the ddr, that is, the audience-hall, we halted in some
138 porticoes | by the third gateway. The qao1! elsa of al-Yaman
came up and greeted me and I greeted the Wazir. The captain
Ibrahlm42 brought ten pieces of cloth and made obeisance
towards the Sultana, throwing down one piece, then to the
Wazir, throwing down another in the same way. When he had
thrown them all down he was asked about me and answered:

42 Previously (p. 833) called 'Omar.

834
 IBN BATJUTA'S RECEPTION IN MAHAL
'I do not know him.' Afterwards they brought out betel and
rose-water to us, this being their mark of honour, and lodged
us in a house, where they sent us food, consisting of a large
platter of rice surrounded by plates containing salted meat,
chickens, ghee, and fish.
On the following morning I went with the captain and the
qao1! elsa of al-Yaman to visit a hospice which had been built
at the extremity of the island by the pious Shaikh Najlb, 43 and
we returned during the night. In the morning following that
night the Wazir sent to me a robe and a hospitality gift |
including rice, ghee, salted meat, coconuts and the honey 139
made from them which they call qurbdni (the meaning of
which is 'eater of sugar'), 44 and along with this they brought
100,000 cowries for my expenses.
When ten days had passed a ship arrived from Ceylon
bringing some poor brethren, Arabs and Persians, who recog-
nized me and told the Wazlr's attendants who I was. This
made him still more delighted to have me, and at the begin-
ning of Ramadan45 he sent for me. I found the amirs and
Wazlrs present and when the food was brought in on tables,
each table serving for a number of guests, the Wazir made me
sit beside him, the others in his company being the qao*I 'Isa,
the Wazir fdmalddn and the Wazir eOmar daharad, which
means 'commander of the army'. 46 Their dishes are rice,
fowls, ghee, fish, salted meat, and cooked banana, and after
eating they drink coconut honey mixed with spices which
facilitates digestion of the food.
On | the ninth of Ramadan the Wazlr's son-in-law, hisi4o
daughter's husband, died. She was previously married to the
Sultan Shihab al-Dln, but neither of her husbands had con-
summated the marriage because of her youth, and the Wazir
brought her back to his house and gave me her house, which
was a very fine one. I asked his permission to give a banquet
43 The Habshigefanu Magan, in memory of Shaikh Najlb, was in the precincts
of the Lonu Ziyare at Male, but both have now disappeared. It may have included
a mosque. (Andrew Forbes, 'The Mosque in the Maldive Islands', p. 62).
44 Hakurpani, jaggery water.
45 17 January 1344.
46 I.E. does not specify the vowels of this word, which seems to be Bell's
Dahara, one of three chief ministers, but who had come to have no particular
department to direct.

835
 THE MALDIVES

to the poor brethren who had come from visiting the Foot [of
Adam, in Ceylon]. He gave permission, and sent me five
sheep, which are rarities among them because they are im-
ported from Ma'bar, Mulaibar, and Maqdashaw, together
with rice, chickens, ghee, and spices. I sent all this to the
house of the Wazlr Sulaiman the mandyak, who had it excel-
lently cooked for me, and added to it, besides sending carpets
and brass utensils. We broke our fast, according to the custom,
in the Sultana's palace, in company with the Wazlr, and I
asked his permission for some of the ministers to attend my
HI banquet, and he said to me: 'And I shall come too.' | So I
thanked him and on returning home to my house found him
already there with the ministers and high officials. The Wazlr
sat in an elevated wooden pavilion, and all the amirs and
ministers who came greeted him and threw down an unsewn
cloth, so that there were collected about a hundred cloths,
which were taken by the poor brethren. The food was then
served, and when the guests had eaten, the Qur'an readers
chanted in beautiful voices. The poor brethren then began
their ritual chants and dances. I had made ready a fire and they
went into it, treading it with their feet, and some of them ate
it as one eats sweetmeats, until it was extinguished.
Account of part of the Waztr's generosity towards me. When the
night came to an end, the Wazlr withdrew and I went with him.
As we passed by an orchard belonging to the treasury he said to
me: 'This orchard is yours, and I shall build a house in it for you
to live in.' I thanked him and prayed for his happiness. Then |
142 on the next day he sent me a slave-girl and his servant said to
me: 'The Wazlr says to you that if this girl is agreeable to you
she is yours, but if not he will send you a Marhata girl.' Now the
Marhata girls were much to my liking, so I said to him: 'I should
prefer the Marhata', and he sent her to me. Her name was
Qulistan, which means 'Flower of the Garden', 47 and she knew
the Persian language, so she pleased me, for the people of those
islands have a language of their own which I did not understand.
Then on the following day the Wazlr sent me a Ma'bari
slave-girl called 'Anbari,48 and on the night of the same day

47 Persian gulistan, 'rose garden'.

48 I.e. perfumed with ambergris.

836
 IBN BATTUTA TRIES TO LEAVE THh. MALDIVES

he came to me after the last evening prayer with a small

number of his friends and came into the house accompanied
by two small slave-boys. When I greeted him he asked how
things were with me, and I thanked him and prayed for his
happiness, whereupon one of the slave-boys laid a bundle
down before him rather like a clothes bag and took out | of it 143
some silk cloths and a box containing pearls and jewellery.
The WazTr gave these to me saying: 'If I had sent them to you
with the slave-girl she would have said that they were her own
property which she had brought from her master's house; but
now they are your property so give them to her as a present',
whereupon I thanked him and prayed for his happiness for he
was entitled to thanks, God's mercy on him.
Account of his displeasure and my intention to leave and subsequent
stay. The WazTr Sulaiman the mandyak had sent to me propos-
ing that I should marry his daughter, and I sent to the WazTr
Jamal al-Dm to ask his permission for my acceptance. The
messenger returned to me and said: 'The proposal does not
find favour with him, for he wishes to marry you to his own
daughter when her period of widowhood comes to an end.'49
But I for my part refused that, in fear of the ill-luck attached
to her, for she had already had two husbands who had died
before consummating the marriage. Meanwhile I was seriously
attacked by fever, | for every person who comes to this island 144
inevitably contracts fever. I firmly determined therefore to
leave it, sold some of the jewellery for cowries, and hired a
vessel to take me to Bengal. When I went to take leave of the
WazTr, the qa^T came out to me and said: 'The WazTr says to
you: "If you wish to go, give us back what we have given you
and go".' I replied: 'I have bought cowries with some of the
jewels, so do what you like with those.' He came back to me
and said: 'He says "We gave you gold, not cowries".' I said to
him: 'I shall sell them and bring you the gold.' So I sent for
the merchants, asking them to buy back the cowries from me,
but the WazTr forbade them to do so, his purpose in all this
being to prevent my leaving him. Afterwards he sent one of
his courtiers to me to say: 'The WazTr says "Stay with us, and

49 Under Islamic law, as a widow who was not pregnant, she could remarry after
four months and ten days.

837
 THE MALDIVES

you shall have what you will".' So reasoning with myself that
1451 was in their power and that if I did not stay | of my own free
will I should be kept by main force, and that it was better to
stay of my own choice, I said to his messenger: 'Very well, I
shall stay with him.' When the messenger returned to him he
was overjoyed at this and summoned me. As I entered he rose
and embraced me saying: 'We wish you to stay near us and
you wish to go away from us!' I made my excuses, which he
accepted, and said to him: 'If you wish me to stay I have some
conditions to make.' He replied: 'Granted. Name them.' I
said: 'I cannot walk about on foot.' Now it is their custom that
no one rides there except the Wazlr, and when I had been
given a horse and rode out on it, the population, men and
boys, used to follow me in amazement. At length I com-
plained to him, so he had the dunqura beaten and a public
proclamation made that no one was to follow me. The dunqura
146 is a sort of brass basin | which is beaten with an iron rod and
can be heard at a great distance; 50 after beating it any procla-
mation which it is desired to make is publicly announced. The
Wazlr said to me: 'If you wish to ride in a palanquin, do so; if
not we have a stallion and a mare choose which of them you
wish.' So I chose the mare and it was brought to me on the
spot along with a robe. Then I said: 'What shall I do with the
cowries I bought?' He replied: 'Send one of your companions
to sell them for you in Bengal.' I said: 'I shall, on condition
that you too send someone to help him in the transaction.' He
agreed to that, so I sent off my travelling companion Abu
Muhammad b. Farfran and they sent with him a man named
al-FIajj "All. It happened that the sea became stormy and
they threw overboard all that they had even down to the
provisions, water, mast, and waterskins, and remained for
sixteen nights without sails or rudder or anything else. At
147 length | after suffering hunger and thirst and hardship they
came out at the island of Ceylon. My companion Abu Muham-
mad returned to me a year later having visited the Foot [of
Adam], which he visited a second time with me.
Account of the Festival which I attended in their company. When

so
"Kurd means a water pot; dun or dum means 'smoke'; alternatively, don
means 'pale or ripe-coloured' ... A brass pot would be lo kura" (C.H.B.R.).

838
 FESTIVAL AT THE KND OF RAMAQAN

the month of Ramadan ended, the Wazir sent me a robe and

we went out to the mu$alla\ the road by which the WazTr
would pass from his house to the mu$alld was decorated and
spread with cloths, and kuttas of cowries were placed right and
left of it. Every one of the amirs and principal men who had a
house on his way had planted beside it little coco-palms, areca
trees and bananas, and had stretched from one tree to the next
cords from which he hung green nuts. The owner of the house
would then stand beside its door and as the WazTr passed
would throw down in front of him a piece of silk or cotton 148
cloth, which his slaves picked up together with the cowries
placed along the road. All this time the Wazir walked on his
own feet, wearing an Egyptian farajiya of goat's hair and a
large turban, with a silk cloth round his shoulders, and four
parasols over his head. He had sandals on his feet while
everybody else was barefoot. He was preceded by trumpets,
bugles and drums, and in front of and behind him were troops
all of whom were shouting the takbir until they came to the
mu$alla.
After the prayer the Wazir's son delivered the khutba, then a
litter was brought in which the Wazir took his seat and the
amirs and the Wazirs did homage to him and threw down
cloths according to the custom. He had not ridden in a litter
before this because it is a thing which is not done except by
the kings. The bearers then lifted him up and I rode my
horse, and so we entered the palace, where the Wazir took his
seat in an elevated place, attended by the Wazirs and amirs, 149
and the slaves stood with shields, swords and staves. After the
food had been served followed by the areca-nut and the betel,
a small plate containing Macassar sandalwood51 was carried
round and when a group of those present had eaten they
rubbed themselves with sandalwood. I saw that day on one of
their dishes some sardines, salted but uncooked, which had
been brought to them as a gift from Kawlam, for they are
plentiful in the land of Mulaibar. The Wazir took a sardine
and as he was eating it he said to me: 'Eat some of these for
they are not found in our country.' I replied: 'How can I eat

51 m.gaf.ri, probably referring, not to the town of Macassar (Ujung Pandang),

but to the island of Celebes (Sulawesi).

839
 THE MALDIVES

them when they are uncooked?' He said: 'But they are

cooked.' I replied: 'I know better for they are common in our
country.'
Account of my marriage and my appointment as qadt. On the
second of Shawwal52 I made an agreement with the Wazlr
Sulaiman the mandyak to marry his daughter, so I sent to the
iso Wazlr Jamal | al-Dln requesting that the ceremony might be
held in his presence at the palace. He gave his consent, and
sent the customary betel and sandalwood. The guests arrived
but the Wazlr Sulaiman delayed. He was sent for but still did
not come, and on being summoned a second time excused
himself on the ground of his daughter's illness. The Wazlr
then said to me privily: 'His daughter has refused and she is
her own mistress. The people have assembled, so what do you
say to marrying the Sultana's mother-in-law?' (It was her
daughter to whom the WazTr's son was married.) I said: 'Very
well', so the qao1! and notaries were summoned, and the
profession of faith recited. The Wazlr paid her dowry, and she
was conducted to me a few days later. She was one of the best
of women, and was so affectionate that when I married her she
used to anoint me with perfume and cense my garments,
laughing all the while and without showing any displeasure.
After this marriage the Wazlr forced me to take the office of
151 qao!l. ! The reason for this was that I had reproached the qa^I
for his practice of taking a tenth of all estates when he divided
them amongst the heirs, saying to him: 'You should have
nothing but a fee agreed upon between you and the heirs.'
Besides he never did anything properly. When I was
appointed, I strove my utmost to establish the prescriptions of
the Sacred Law. Lawsuits there are not like those in our land.
The first bad custom I changed was the practice of divorced
wives of staying in the houses of their former husbands, for
they all do so till they marry another husband. I put a stop to
that. About twenty-five men who had acted thus were brought
before me; I had them beaten and paraded in the bazaars, and
the women put away from them. Afterwards I gave strict
injunctions that the prayers were to be observed, and ordered
152 men to go swiftly to the streets and bazaars after the Friday

17 February 1344.

840
 IBN BATTUTA QUARRELS WITH A WAZIR

service; anyone whom they found not having prayed I had

beaten and paraded. I compelled the salaried prayer-leaders
and muezzins to be assiduous in their duties and sent letters to
all the islands to the same effect. I tried also to determine how
women dressed, but I could not manage this.
Account of the arrival of the Wazir 'Abdallah ibn Muhammad of
#a4ramaut, whom the Sultan Shihab al-Din had exiled to al-
Suwaid, and of what took place between us. I had married his step-
daughter, the daughter of his wife, and I was exceedingly fond
of her. When the Wazir sent for him to return to the island of
Mahal, I sent him presents, went out to meet him and accom-
panied him to the palace. He saluted the Wazir who assigned
him as his residence a fine house, where I used to visit him. It
happened that I went into retreat during the feast of Rama-
tfan, and | all the people came to visit me except him, until the 153
Wazir Jamal al-Din visited me when he came with him by way
of keeping him company. A coolness grew up between us, and
when I came out of retreat the maternal uncles of my wife who
was his step-daughter, that is to say the sons of the Wazir
Jamal al-Sinjarl, laid a complaint before me. Their father had
appointed the Wazir 'Abdallah as their guardian and their
property was still in his hands although they had emerged
from his tutelage under the provisions of the Law, and they
demanded that he should be brought before the tribunal. It
was my custom when I sent for any of the parties to a case to
send him a scrap of paper, with or without writing on it, on
receipt of which he would at once come to the tribunal of the
Law, and if he did not I punished him. I sent for him accord-
ingly in the usual way, but he was indignant at my action,
made it a grudge against me and became secretly hostile to
me. He sent an agent to speak on his behalf, and I was
informed that he had used some unseemly language.
It was the custom of the people, both small and great, | to 154
do homage to him as they did to the Wazir Jamal al-Din. Their
manner of doing homage is to put the forefinger to the ground,
then to kiss and lay it on their heads. I ordered the crier to
announce in the Sultan's palace, in the presence of witnesses,
that anyone who did homage to the Wazir 'Abdallah in the
same way as to the great Wazir would be visited by severe
penalties, and I took an engagement from him that he would
841
 THE MALDIVES

not permit the people to do this, all of which made him still
more hostile. I also married another wife, the daughter of a
WazTr, a man highly respected among them whose grandfather
was the Sultan Da'Od, the descendant of Sultan Abmad
Shanuraza. Afterwards I married a wife who had formerly been
married to the Sultan Shihab al-Dm, and I built three houses
in the garden which the Wazir had given me. My fourth wife,
who was the daughter-in-law of the WazTr 'Abdallah, used to
live in her own house, and she was my favourite amongst
155 them. After I had become allied by marriage to these persons
whom I have mentioned the Wazir and the islanders stood in
awe of me, because of their weakness, and they exerted
themselves to turn the Wazir against me by slanders, Wazir
'Abdallah taking the largest part in this, until our relations
became strained.
Account of my separation from them and the reason for it. It
happened one day that a slave belonging to the Sultan Jalal al-
Dm was complained of to the Wazir by his wife who informed
him that he was at the house of one of the Sultan's concubines
and committing adultery with her. The WazTr sent witnesses
who entered the concubine's house, found the slave sleeping
with her in one bed, and arrested them both. On the following
morning, when I learned of the event I went to the audience
hall and sat in my usual place without saying a word about the
affair. One of the courtiers came out to me and said: 'The
156 WazTr asks you if there is anything you want', | to which I said:
'No.' It was his intention that I should speak of the affair of
the concubine and the slave, since it had been my custom to
let no case arise without passing judgment in it, but when the
estrangement and hostility intervened I had omitted to do so.
After this I went back to my house and took my seat in the
place of judgments, when one of the WazTrs appeared and said
to me: 'The WazTr informs you that yesterday there took place
such and such (referring to the case of the concubine and the
slave) so give your decision in regard to them according to the
law.' I replied: 'This is a case in which it is not fitting to give
judgment except in the Sultan's palace', and returned to it
where there was a concourse of people. After having the
concubine and the slave brought in I gave orders that both of
them should be beaten because of their intimacy, and then set
842
 IBN BATTUTA SENTENCES ADULTERERS

the woman at liberty and imprisoned the slave. On my return

to my house the Wazlr sent some of his principal attendants |
to ask me to set him at liberty. I said to them: 'Are you going is?
to intercede for a negro slave who has violated his master's
honour, when you yourselves but yesterday deposed the Sul-
tan Shihab al-Dln and put him to death because he had
entered the house of one of his slaves?' Thereupon I sent for
the slave and had him beaten with bamboo rods, which give
heavier blows than whips, and paraded round the island with a
rope round his neck. When they went to the Wazlr and told
him of this he was much agitated and fell into a violent rage,
assembled the ministers and army commanders and sent for
me. I came to him, and though I usually made obeisance to
him, I did not make obeisance but simply said: 'Sa/am
*alaikun?'. Then I said to those present: 'Be my witnesses
that I resign the office of the qatfl because of my inability to
carry out its duties.' The Wazir addressed me, whereupon I
mounted [to the dais], sat down in a place facing him, | and iss
answered him in the most uncompromising manner. At this
point the muezzin chanted the call to the sunset prayer and he
went into his palace saying: 'They say that I am Sultan, but I
sent for this fellow to vent my wrath on him and he vented his
wrath on me.' The respect in which I was held amongst them
was due solely to the Sultan of India, for they were aware of
the regard in which he held me, and even though they are far
distant from him yet the fear of him is in their hearts.
When the Wazlr entered his house he sent the former qa^I
who had been removed from office to see me. This man had
an arrogant tongue, and said to me: 'Our master asks you why
you violated his dignity in the presence of witnesses, and did
not make obeisance to him.' I answered: 'I used to make
obeisance to him only because I was on good terms with him,
but when his attitude changed I gave that up. The greeting of
Muslims is the Saldm and nothing more, and I said Salami He
sent him to me a second time to say: 'You are aiming only at
leaving us; give back your wives' dowries and pay your debts |
and go, if you will.' On hearing this I made obeisance to him, 159
went to my house, and acquitted all the debts I had con-
tracted. He had given me just before then the upholstery and
other furnishings of a house, such as brass utensils and so
843
 THE MALDIVES

forth, for he used to give me everything that I asked for, and

show me affection and honour, but he had changed his attitu-
de and been made to feel afraid of me. Then when he heard
that I had acquitted my debt and was bent upon going, he
repented of what he had said and withheld his permission for
my departure. So I swore with the most solemn oaths that I
had no alternative but to leave, and removed all my posses-
sions to a mosque on the coast and divorced one of my wives.
Another of them was with child, so I fixed a term of nine
months for my return to her, failing which she was her own
mistress. I took with me my wife who had been married to the
Sultan Shihab al-Din, in order to hand her over to her father in
160the island of | Muluk, and my first wife, the one whose
daughter was the sister of the Sultana.
I made a compact with the Wazlr eOmar daharad and the
Wazlr Hasan, the commander of the sea, 53 that I should go to
the land of Ma'bar, the king of which was the husband of my
wife's sister, and fetch troops from there to bring the islands
under his authority, and that I should be his representative in
them. I arranged that the signal between us should be the
hoisting of white flags on the ships; when they saw these they
were to rise in revolt on the shore. I had never suggested this
to myself until the Wazlr became estranged from me. He was
afraid of me and used to say to others: 'This man will without
doubt seize the Wazirate, either in my lifetime or after my
death.' He was constantly making enquiries about me and
would say: 'I have heard that the King of India has sent him
money to aid him to revolt against me.' He feared my depar-
ture, lest I should fetch troops from Ma'bar, and sent to me
i6i asking me to stay until | he could fit out a vessel for me but I
refused.
The Sultana's sister complained to her of her mother's
departure with me. The Sultana therefore tried to stop her but
could not do so, and when she saw her determination to go she
said to her: 'All the jewels that you have come from the money
of the bandar, if you have witnesses that Jalal al-Din gave
them to you, good and well, otherwise you must return them',
and although the jewellery was of considerable value she

53 He has previously (pp. 140, 143) called him Sulaiman.

844
 MULUK ISLAND

returned it all to them. The Wazlrs and chief men came to me

at the mosque and begged me to return. I said to them: 'If I
had not sworn I should return.' They said: 4Go to one of the
islands so as to keep your oath and then return', so I said:
'Very well', in order to satisfy them. When the night fixed for
my departure came I went on to take leave of the Wazlr, and
he embraced me and wept so copiously that his tears dropped
on my feet. He passed the following night guarding the island
in person, for fear that my relatives by marriage | and myi62
friends would rise in revolt against him.
I now set sail and reached the island of the Wazlr CA1I. Here
my wife was attacked by severe pains and wished to go back, so
I divorced her and left her there, sending word to that effect to
the Wazlr, because she was the mother of his son's wife. I
divorced also the wife for whom I had set a fixed term, and sent
for a slave-girl of whom I was very fond, and we continued to
travel through the islands from one district to another.
Account of the women who have a single breast. In one of these
islands I saw a woman who had only one breast. She had two
daughters one of whom resembled her in having one breast,
and the other had two breasts but one of them was large and full
of milk while the other was small and had none. I was aston-
ished at their condition.
We came to a little island in that archipelago in which there
was but one house, | occupied by a weaver. He had a wife and 163
family, a few coco-palms and a small boat, with which he used
to fish and to cross over to any of the islands he wished to visit.
His island contained also banana bushes, but we saw no land
birds on it except two crows, which came out to us on our arrival
and circled above our vessel. And I swear I envied that man,
and wished that the island had been mine, that I might have
made it my retreat until the inevitable hour should befall me.
I then came to the island of Muluk where the ship belong-
ing to the captain Ibrahim was lying. This was the ship in
which I had decided to travel to Ma'bar. Ibrahlm and his
companions met me and showed me great hospitality. The
WazTr had written to me that I was to receive in this island 120
bustus vikudah, that is of cowries,54 along with twenty bowls of

54 Not identified. Cowries are bolt (C.H.B.R).

845
 THE MALDIVES

\Matwan, that is | coconut honey, 55 and a stated quantity of betel,

areca-nuts, and fish every day. I stayed seventy days at Muluk
and married two wives there.
This is one of the finest of the islands in greenness and
fertility. One of the astonishing things that I saw there was
that a branch cut from the trees that grow there and planted in
the ground or in a garden hedge will throw out leaves and grow
into a tree, 56 and I saw also that the pomegranates there never
cease to carry fruit all the year round. The islanders were
afraid that the captain Ibrahlm would plunder them at the
moment of sailing, so they proposed to seize all the weapons
on his ship and keep them until the day of his departure. A
dispute arose over this, and we returned to Mahal but did not
enter the harbour. I wrote to the Wazir to tell him what had
occurred, whereupon he wrote to say that there was no cause
for seizing the weapons. We returned to Muluk and set sail
165from there in the middle of RabHI, 45. 57 | In Shaeban of
the same year the Wazir Jama! al-Dln died - May God have
mercy upon him. The Sultana was with child by him, she gave
birth after his death and the Wazir 'Abdallah married her.

^ Not identified. 'Coconut honey is diyd-hakurff (C.H.B.R.).

56 M2ik (p. 351, n. 33) suggests that the pipal tree, Fiats re/igiosa L., may be
meant, and that its presence may be a relic of Buddhism.
57 22 August 1344.

846
 CHAPTER XVIII

Ceylon
e set sail without an experienced pilot on board, the

W distance between the islands and Ma'bar being a

three days' journey, and travelled for nine days,
emerging on the ninth day at the island of Ceylon. We saw the
mountain of Sarandlb there, rising into the heavens like a
column of smoke. 1 When we came to the island, the sailors
said: 'This port is not in the territory of the Sultan whose
country can safely be visited by merchants. It is a port in the
territory of the Sultan Ayr! Shakarwat! who is an evildoing
tyrant and keeps pirate vessels.'2 We were afraid to put into
this harbour, but as a gale arose thereafter and we dreaded
drowning, I said to the captain: 'Put me ashore | and I shall get 166
you a safe-conduct from this Sultan.' He did as I asked and
put me ashore, whereupon the infidels came to us and said:
'What are you?' I told them that I was the brother-in-law and
friend of the Sultan of Ma'bar, that I had come to visit him,
and that the contents of the ship were a present for him. They
went to their Sultan and informed him of this. Thereupon he
summoned me, and I visited him in the town of Battala
[Puttalam], which is his capital. It is a small and pretty town,
surrounded by a wooden wall with wooden towers. The whole
of its coasts are covered with branches of cinnamon trees
brought down by torrents and heaped up like mounds on the
shore. They are taken without payment by the people of
Ma'bar and Mulaibar, but in return for this they give presents
1 Adam's Peak, which is the most spectacular, though not the highest, moun-
tain in the island.
2 The title used by a dynasty from south India where they had been feudatories
of the Pandyas and as such had invaded Ceylon. With the Muslim conquest of the
Pandya realm they became independent rulers of northern Ceylon. The king I.E.
visited was probably the sixth of the dynasty, Martanda Singai Ariyan.

847
 CEYLON

of woven cloth and similar articles to the Sultan. It is a day and

a night's journey from this island to the land of Ma'bar. It
16? has also much brazil-wood and Indian aloes, | which is called
kalakhi, but it differs from the qamdri and the qdquK also, and
we shall describe it later. 3
Account of the Sultan of Ceylon. His name is AyrI ShakarwatI, and
he is a Sultan powerful on the sea. Once when I was in
Ma'bar I saw a hundred vessels of his there, some small,
some large. There were in the port at that time eight vessels
belonging to the Sultan [of Ma'bar] which were about to
make the voyage to al-Yaman, so the Sultan gave orders to
make ready all equipment and called up troops to guard his
vessels. When the men from Ceylon saw that they could not
effect a surprise seizure of them they said: 'We have come
only to protect some vessels of ours which are also on their way
to al-Yaman.'
When I entered the presence of this infidel Sultan, he rose
168 to meet me, | seated me beside him, and spoke most kindly to
me. He said: 'Your companions may land in safety and will be
my guests until they sail, for the Sultan of Ma'bar and I are
friends.' He then gave orders for my lodging and I stayed with
him three days, enjoying great consideration which increased
every day. He understood Persian and was delighted with the
tales I told him of kings and countries. One day, when I came
into his presence, he had before him a large quantity of pearls
which had been brought from the pearl dives in his country,
and his entourage were separating out the valuable ones from
the others. He said to me: 'Have you seen pearl dives in the
countries that you have come from?' I replied: 'Yes! I have
seen them in the island of Qais and the island of Kish which
belongs to Ibn al-Sawamill.'4 He said: 'I have heard of them',
then taking some pearls from those in front of him he said:
169'Are there in that island pearls like these?' I replied: 'I have
seen [only] smaller ones', which so pleased him that he said:
'They are yours', and added: 'Do not be shy, but ask me for
anything that you want.' I replied: 'Since reaching this island
I have but one desire, to visit the blessed Foot, the Foot of

3 See below pp. 881-2.

4 By Kish is meant Kishm. See II, p. 403, n. 127.

848
 JOURNEY TO ADAM'S PEAK
Adam.' (They call him Baba, and Eve they call Mama.) 'That
is simple', he answered. 'We shall send an escort with you to
take you to it.' 'That is what I want', said I, then I added:
'And this ship that I came in can set out in safety for Ma'bar,
and when I return [from the Foot] you will send me in your
own vessels.' 'Certainly', he replied. When I related this to
the captain, however, he said to me: 'I shall not set sail until
you return, even if I wait a year on your account', so I told the
Sultan this and he said: 'He will remain as my guest until you
come back.'
The Sultan then gave me a palanquin, which was carried by
his slaves on their shoulders, and sent with me four jugts*
whose custom it is | to make an annual pilgrimage to the Foot, i?o
three Brahmans, ten other persons from his entourage, and
fifteen men to carry provisions. Water is plentiful along that
road. On the first day we encamped beside a river, which we
crossed on a raft, made of bamboo canes. Thence we jour-
neyed to Manar MandalT [Minneri-Mandel], a pretty town
situated at the extremity of the Sultan's territories. 5 The in-
habitants regaled us with a fine banquet of buffalo calves,
which they hunt in a forest there and bring in alive, along with
rice, ghee, fish, fowls and milk. We did not see a single
Muslim in this town, except one man from Khurasan, who was
exhausted as the result of an illness, but who came on with us.
We continued our journey to Bandar Salawat [Ghilaw], a small
town, | after which our way lay through rugged and wellm
watered country. In this part there are many elephants, but
they do no harm to pilgrims and strangers, through the blessed
virtue of the Shaikh AbO 'Abdallah b. Khafif (God's mercy
on him) who was the first to open up this road for the pilgrim-
age to the Foot. These infidels used formerly to prevent
Muslims from making this pilgrimage and would maltreat
them, and neither eat nor trade with them, but since the
adventure that happened to the Shaikh Abu 'Abdallah, as we
have related in the first journey, when the elephants killed his

5 It is about ten miles from Puttalam. At this time central and southern Ceylon
were ruled by Sinhalese kings who sometimes paid tribute to the Arya Cakravarti.
At this time two brothers ruled jointly, Bhuvanekabahu IV and Parakramabahu V
from Garhpola and Dadigama respectively. It seems that the AJagakkonara (n. 8
below) also claimed to be independent.

849
 C E Y I. O N

companions and he alone of them escaped, and an elephant

carried him on its back, 6 the infidels honour the Muslims,
allow them to enter their houses, eat with them, and have no
suspicions regarding their dealings with their wives and
children. 7 To this day they continue to pay the greatest vener-
ation to this Shaikh, and call him 'The Great Shaikh'.
172 After this we came to | the town of Kunakar, which is the
capital of the principal Sultan in this land. 8 It is built in a
narrow valley between two hills, near a great channel called
the Channel of Rubies, because rubies are found in it. Out-
side this town is the mosque of Shaikh 'Othman of ShTraz,
known as the Shawush; the Sultan and inhabitants of the town
visit his tomb and venerate him. He was the guide to the
Foot, and when his hand and foot were cut off, his sons and
slaves took his place as guides. The reason for his mutilation
was that he killed a cow. The Hindu infidels have a law that
anyone who kills a cow is slaughtered in the same fashion or
else put in its skin and burned. As Shaikh 'Othman was so
highly revered by them, they cut off his hand and foot instead,
and assigned to him the revenues of one of the bazaars. |
173 Description of the Sultan of Kunakar. He is called the Kunar, and
possesses a white elephant, the only white elephant I have
seen in the whole world. He rides on it at festivals and puts
great rubies on its forehead. It happened that his officers of
state revolted against him, blinded him, and made his son
ruler, but he is still there, though blind.
Description of the rubies. The marvellous rubies called bahramdn
[carbuncles] are found only in this town. Some are taken from
the channel, and these are regarded by them as the most

6 See II, pp. 314-15.

7 It has been suggested that Muslim ascetics helped to popularize the Arab
traders trying to enter the gem market with the local people who for religious
reasons favoured their Chinese Buddhist rivals (S. M. Yusuf, in University of Ceylon
History of Ceylon, I, pt 2, p. 706).
8 The name of the place and the title given below to the ruler, the Kunar,
probably reflect AJagakkonara, a South Indian family which had achieved
considerable power, and were related to, and rivals of, the Sinhalese kings of
Garhpola. The location of Kunakar is disputed. It is often identified with Kurun-
agala, as by Gibb (Selections, p. 365, n. 6) but I.B.'s description requires some-
where closer to Adam's Peak; the reference to rubies suggests Ratnapura, but the
archaeologist Mr Roland Silva objects that there was no route from Puttalam to
Ratnapura.

850
 RUBIES AND MONKEYS

valuable, 9 and some are obtained by digging. In the island of

Ceylon rubies are found in all parts. The land is private
property, and a man buys a parcel of it and digs for rubies. He
finds white stones, deeply-cracked, and it is inside these that
the rubies are formed. | He gives them to the lapidaries who 174
scrape them down until they split away from the ruby stones.
Some of them are red, some yellow, and some blue, which
they call nailam. 10 Their custom is that all rubies of the value
of a hundred fanams belong to the Sultan, who pays their price
and takes them; those of less value belong to the finders. A
hundred fanams equal in value six gold dinars.
All the women in the island of Ceylon have necklaces of
rubies of different colours and wear them also on their arms
and legs in place of bracelets and anklets. The Sultan's slave-
girls make a network of rubies and wear it on their heads. I
have seen on the forehead of the white elephant11 seven ruby-
stones each larger than a hen's egg, and I saw in the possession
of the Sultan Ayr! ShakarwatI a bowl | as large as a man's hand 175
made of rubies, containing oil of aloes. When I showed my
astonishment he said: 'We have things larger than that.'
We then set out from Kunakar and halted at a cave called
after Uspa Mafrmud the Lur, a pious man who dug out this
cave at the foot of a hill beside a small channel. From there we
went on and halted at a channel called KJidr Buznah, the word
buznah meaning 'monkeys'. 12
Account of the monkeys. There are in these mountains vast
numbers of monkeys. They are black and have long tails, and
their males are bearded like men. 13 Shaikh 'Othman and his
son and others as well told me that these monkeys have | a 176
chief, whom they obey as if he were a Sultan. He fastens on
his head a fillet of tree leaves and leans upon a staff. On his
right and his left are four monkeys carrying staves in their
hands. When the chief monkey sits down the four monkeys
9 Mzik (p. 360, n. 12) notes that the precious stones were found in the detritus
deposited in the pools at the edge of the stream.
10 Sapphires.
11 A white elephant was 'the emblem of supreme power in those days' (S.
Paranavitana in University of Ceylon History of Ceylon, I, pt 2, p. 640). See Plate II.
12 Persian buzinah, 'monkey'.
13 Wanderoo monkeys, Macacus si/enus, which are black with long tails and
prominent beards.

851
 CEYLON

stand behind him, and his female and young come and sit in
front of him every day. The other monkeys come and sit at a
distance from him, and then one of the four monkeys addres-
ses them and all the monkeys withdraw. After this each one
brings a banana or an orange or some such fruit, and the
monkey chief with his young and the four monkeys eat. One
of thejugfs told me that he had seen the four monkeys in the
presence of their chief beating a monkey with sticks and after
the beating pulling out its hair. Some trustworthy persons told
me as a fact that when one of these monkeys seizes a girl who
177 is unable to defend herself | he has intercourse with her. I was
told by one of the inhabitants of this island that there was in
his house a monkey of this kind; one of his daughters went
into a chamber and the animal followed her in, and though she
screamed at it, it got the better of her, and he added: 'When
we came into the room after her it was between her legs and
so we killed it.'
Then we journeyed to the Bamboo Pool, from which Abu
'Abdallah b. Khafif took the two rubies he gave to the Sultan
of this island, as we have related in the first journey. 14 We
continued our journey to a place called 'The Old Woman's
Hut', which is the end of the inhabited part, and went on to
the cave of Baba Tahir, who was a devotee, and then to the
cave of al-Sablk. This al-Sablk was a Sultan of the infidels,
who became an anchorite in that place. 1S |
178 Account of the flying leeches. In this place we saw the flying leech,
which they call zulu. 16 It is found in trees and in the vegetation
near water. When a man approaches, it jumps out at him, and
wheresoever it alights on his body the blood flows. The in-
habitants keep a lemon in readiness for it; they squeeze this
over it and it falls off them; then they scrape the place on
which it alighted with a wooden knife which they have for the

14 See II, p. 315.

15 Identified in William Skeen, Adam's Peak, Colombo, 1870, p. 176; relying on
Samuel Lee's translation Skeen calls the king Slbak.
16 A Persian word. M2ik (p. 361, n. 14) identifies as Haemobdella ceylanica, one
of the smallest and most common leeches, which can become dangerous. Robert
Knox (An Historical Relation of the island Ceylon, 1681, ch. vi) writes: 'Some
therefore will tie a piece of Lemon and Salt in a rag and fasten it unto a stick, and
ever and anon strike it upon their Legs to make the Leeches drop off: others will
scrape them off with a reed cut flat and sharp in the fashion of a knife'.

852
 ADAM S PEAK

purpose. It is related that as a certain traveller was passing by

this place the leeches fastened on him. He took no notice and
did not squeeze lemons on them but he lost so much blood
that he died. His name was Baba Khuzi, and there is a cave
there which is called by his name. We continued our journey
to the seven caves, then to the pass of Iskandar, 17 the grotto of
Al-IsfahanI | and a spring and an uninhabited castle, below 179
which is a hollow called the Hollow of Gah-i-eArifan [Place
of Mystics]. At the same place is the cave of the bitter orange
and the cave of the Sultan and close by is the darwdza of the
mountain, that is the place of access to it. 18
Description of the mountain of Sarandib. This is one of the
highest mountains in the world. 19 We saw it from the sea when
we were nine days' journey away, and when we climbed it we
saw the clouds below us, shutting out our view of its base. On
it there are many evergreen trees and flowers of various col-
ours, including a red rose as big as the palm of a hand. They
maintain that on these roses there is writing, in which can be
read the name of Allah and the name of His Apostle (peace be
upon him). There are two tracks on the mountain leading to
the Foot, one | called Baba track and the other Mama track, iso
meaning Adam and Eve (peace be upon them). The Mama
track is easy and is the route by which the pilgrims return, but
anyone who goes by that way is not considered by them to
have made the pilgrimage at all. The Baba track is difficult
and stiff climbing. At the foot of the mountain where the
darwdza is there is a cave, which is ascribed also to Iskandar,
and a spring of water. Former generations cut a sort of stairway
on the mountain, and fixed iron stanchions on it, to which
they attached chains for climbers to hold on by. 20 There are
ten such chains, two at the foot of the hill by the darwaza,
seven successive chains farther on, and the tenth is the 'Chain
of the Profession of Faith', so called because when one
reaches it and looks down to the foot of the hill, he is seized
by apprehensions and recites the profession of faith for fear of

17 Identified by Skeen, p. 227.

18 A Persian word.
19 Its height is 7357 ft.
20 The chains still exist; they have sometimes been attributed to Alexander the
Great.

853
 CEYLON

181 falling. When you climb past this | chain you find a badly kept
track. From the tenth chain to the cave of Khic-r is seven
miles; this cave lies in a spacious place, where there is a spring
which is also called by his name; 21 it is full offish, but no one
catches them. Close to this there are two tanks cut in the rock
on either side of the path. At the cave of Khio'r the pilgrims
leave their belongings and ascend thence for two miles to the
summit of the mountain where the Foot is.
Description of the Foot. The blessed Footprint, the Foot of our
father Adam (God bless him and give him peace) is on a lofty
black rock in a wide plateau. The blessed Foot sank into the
rock far enough to leave its impression hollowed out. It is
eleven spans long. 22 In ancient days the Chinese came here
182 and cut out of the rock the mark of the great toe | and the
adjoining parts. 23 They put this in a temple in the city of
Zaitun [Ch'uan-chou], where it is visited by men from the
farthest parts of the land. In the rock where the Foot is there
are nine holes cut out, in which the infidel pilgrims place
offerings of gold, rubies and pearls. You can see the faqlrs,
after they reach the cave of Khig'r, racing one another from
there to take what there is in these holes. We, for our part,
found nothing in them but a few small stones and a little gold,

21 Identified by Skeen, p. 228.

22 The footprint is ascribed to Adam, Buddha, Shiva and St Thomas by Mus-
lims, Buddhists, Hindus and Christians respectively. Nothing resembling a foot-
print is visible in the rock, and observers have estimated very differently the
dimensions of the irregular depression. 'These discrepancies remind one of the
ancient Buddhist belief regarding such footmarks, that they seemed greater or
smaller in proportion to the faith of the visitor' (Yule, Cathay, IV, p. 322, n. 1).
The illustration in Gibb's Selections, taken from Francois Valentijn's Quden Nieuw
Oost-Indien, vol. V, 1726, shows twin peaks on one of which the footprint can be
seen. The picture has the caption 'Adams Berg' and in the original 'Vertoning van
Adams Voet, boven op den Berg'. Adam's Peak is not a twin peak and the
illustration must be purely imaginative. Arasaratnam, in his annotated translation
of the portion of Valentijn's book concerned with Ceylon (Description of Ceylon,
Hakluyt Society, 1978, p. 49) has noted that part of his description of the Peak
relates to quite a different mountain, Mulgirigala in Hambantota District. Diogo
do Couto (Asia, dec. V, liv. vi, cap. 2), on whom Valentijn largely relied, says
there are two peaks. It is not known that any European had climbed the Peak
before the nineteenth century.
23 According to Marco Polo, in 1284 the Great Khan sent an embassy to Ceylon
which succeeded in bringing back to Khanbaliq two molars, some hair and a green
porphyry bowl preserved on the Peak and believed to have belonged to the
Buddha or to Adam.

854
 DINAWAR

which we gave to the guide. It is customary for the pilgrims to

stay at the cave of Khitfr for three days, visiting the Foot every
morning and evening, and we followed this practice.
When the three days were over we returned by the Mama
track and halted at the cave of Shaim, that is Shaith, son of
Adam, 24 (Peace be upon them both). From there we went on
to the channel of the fish, then to the villages of Kurmula,
Jabarkawan, | Dildlnawa, and Atqalanja, 25 where the Shaikh 183
Abu'Abdallah b. Khafif used to spend the winter. All these
villages and stations are on the mountain. At the foot of the
mountain on the same track, there is an ancient tree called
darakht rawdn, whose leaves never fall off. 26 I have never
seen anyone who has seen its [fallen] leaves. They also give
this tree the name of *the walker', because if you look at it
from the upper part of the mountain, it appears far away and
close to the foot, whereas if you look at it from the foot of
the mountain it is quite the opposite. I saw there a number
ofjugis who never quit the base of the mountain waiting for
its leaves to fall, for it is in a spot where it cannot be reached
at all. They | tell lying tales about it, one being that whoever 184
eats of its leaves regains his youth, even if he be an old man,
but that is false. Beneath the mountain is the great channel
from which the rubies are taken; its water is a bright blue to
the sight.
We travelled thence for two days to Dinawar, a large town
on the coast, inhabited by merchants. 27 In this town there is
an idol known as Dinawar, in a vast temple, in which there are
about a thousand Brahmans and/«.gw, and about five hundred
women, daughters of the Hindus, who sing and dance every
night in front of the idol. The city and all its revenues form an
endowment belonging to the idol, from which all who live in
the temple and who visit it are supplied with food. The idol
itself is of gold, about a man's height, and in the place of its
24 I.E. confuses Shem, the son of Noah, with Seth, the son of Adam.
25 The name survives in that of the sub-district of Atakalan and the village of
Atakalanpan.
26 Miik. suggests that the tree may have been Fiats religtosa. The name is
Persian, meaning 'wandering tree'.
27 Devundara (Dondra), at the southernmost point of Ceylon. A temple for the
image of the recumbent Buddha had been built there early in the century, and the
village of Gafamana assigned to it.

855
 CEYLON

185 eyes it has two great rubies, which, as I was told, shine at
night like lamps.
We went on to the town of Qall, a small place six farsakhs
from Dlnawar, 28 where there was a certain Muslim, called the
captain Ibrahim who gave us hospitality in his place. We then
journeyed to the town of Kalanbu [Colombo], which is one of
the finest and largest towns in Sarandlb. In it resides the Wazlr
and ruler of the sea JalastI, 29 who has with him about five
hundred Abyssinians. On setting out again we came, after
three days' journey, back to Bappala again and visited its Sultan
of whom we have spoken above. I found the captain Ibrahim
awaiting me and we set sail for the land of Ma'bar.

28 Galle.
29 S. M. Yusuf notes; 'It is almost certain that "Jalasti" is not a proper name,
but a designation compounded of jafa, "water", "sea", and a word signifying
"prince", "lord", maybe arasat? (University of Ceylon History of Ceylon, p. 711, n.
25). Yule and Cordier think it probable that he was the Muslim eunuch whom
Marignolli calls Goya Jaan, i.e. Khwaja Jahan (Ca/Aay, III, p. 231, n. 5).

856
 CHAPTER XIX

Coromandel, Malabar and the Maldives

uring the voyage a gale sprang up and our ship nearly

D took in water. We had no knowledgeable pilot on

board. We came to some rocks on which the shipise
narrowly escaped being wrecked, and then into some shallows
where the ship ran aground. We were face to face with death,
and people jettisoned all that they had, and bade farewell to
one another. We cut down the mast and threw it overboard,
and the sailors made a wooden raft. We were then about two
farsakhs from the shore. I was going to climb down to the raft,
when my companions (for I had two slave-girls and two of my
companions with me) said to me: 'Are you going to go down
and leave us?' So I put their safety before my own and said:
'You two go down and take with you the girl that I love.' The
[other] girl said: 'I am a good swimmer and I shall hold on to
one of the raft ropes and swim with them.' So both my
companions (the one being Muhammad b. Farban al-Tuzari,
and the other an Egyptian) and the one girl went on the raft,
the other girl swimming. The sailors tied ropes to the raft, and
swam with their aid. I sent along with them | all the things that is?
I valued and the gems and ambergris, and they reached the
shore in safety because the wind was in their favour. I myself
stayed on the ship. The captain made his way ashore on the
rudder. The sailors set to work to make four rafts, but night
fell before they were completed, and the ship took in water. I
climbed on the poop and stayed there until morning, when a
party of infidels came out to us in a boat and we went ashore
with them to the coast of Ma'bar. We told them that we were
friends of their Sultan, under whose protection they live, and
they wrote informing him of this. He was then two days'
journey away, on an expedition, and I too wrote to him telling
857
 COROMANDEL, MALABAR AND THE MALDIVES

him what had happened to me. Those infidels took us into a

great jungle and brought us some fruit resembling melons.
This is produced by the muql tree and has inside it what
iss resembles cotton containing a honey-like substance | which
they extract and from which they make a sweet called by them
tall, resembling sugar. * They brought also some good fish.
We stayed there three days at the end of which an amir
called Qamar al-Dln arrived from the Sultan with a body of
horse and foot, bringing a palanquin and ten horses. I and my
companions, the captain of the ship, and one of the slave-girls
rode, and the other was carried in the palanquin. We reached
the fort of Harkatu [Arcot], where we spent the night, and
where I left the slave-girls and some of my slaves and compan-
ions. On the following day we arrived at the camp of the
Sultan.
Account of the Sultan of the country of al-Md'bar. 2- He is Ghiyath
al-Dln of Damaghan. At the outset of his career he was a
horseman in the service of the malik Mujlr b. Abl-Raja, one
of the household of the Sultan Mubammad. He then entered
189 the service of the amir Hajl, son of the Sayyid Sultan Jalal al-
Dln. Then he became a malik, and having previously been
called Siraj al-Dln he now took the name of Ghiyath al-Dln.
The land of Ma'bar had been under the rule of the Sultan
Mubammad, the king of DihlT. Then my father-in-law the
Sharif Jalal al-Dln Absan Shah revolted. After reigning there
for five years he was killed and one of his amirs, eAla al-Dln
Udaiji, ruled after him for a year. He then made an expedition
against the infidels and after taking immense riches of theirs
and enormous booty returned to his country. He raided them
again the following year but, after defeating them with enor-
mous slaughter, it chanced on the very day he killed them that
he took his helmet from his head to drink, was hit by a chance
arrow, and died on the spot. They appointed as ruler his son-
in-law Qupb al-Dln, but after forty days disliking his conduct,
1 Muql is the fruit of the doum palm or gingerbread tree, Hyphaena thebaica. The
name I.B. gives to palm-sugar or jaggery is unaccountable.
2 I.B. is one of the few sources for the history of the short-lived Muslim
Sultanate of Madurai. According to the historian clsaml Jalal al-Dln was merely
the kutwal (police chief or commandant of the fort) when he seized power. It has
been suggested that I.B. exaggerated his relative's rank (A. K. Majumdar in R. C.
Majumdar(ed.) The Delhi Sultanate^ p. 244, n. 16).

858
 SULTAN GHIYATH AL-DIN OF MADURAI

| they killed him, and the Sultan Ghiyath al-Dln succeeded 190
him as ruler. He married the daughter of the Sultan Sharif
Jalal al-Dln, and it was her sister that I had married in DihlT.
Account of my coming to the Sultan Ghiyath al-Dtn. When we
reached the neighbourhood of his camp, he sent one of his
chamberlains to welcome us. He himself was lodging in a fort
made of wood. Now, it is a custom throughout India that no
person enters the Sultan's presence without boots on. I had no
boots with me so one of the infidels gave me a pair. There
were a number of Muslims there and I was astonished to find
an infidel show greater courtesy than they did. When I
appeared before the Sultan he bade me be seated, summoned
the qatfl, al-£Iajj $adr al-Zaman Baha' al-Dln, and assigned to
me three tents in his vicinity. They call these tents khiydm. He
also sent furnishings | and some of their food, that is rice and 191
meat. They have the same custom there as in our own country
of serving curdled milk after the meat.
Afterwards I met him and proposed to him the business of
the Maldives and that he should send troops there. He de-
cided to do this and designated the ships for the purpose, the
gift for the Sultana and the robes of honour and presents for
the Wazlrs and amirs. He entrusted me with drawing up his
contract of marriage with the Sultana's sister and ordered that
three ships should be loaded with alms for the poor people of
the islands. He said to me: 'You will come back after five
days.' Khwaja Sarlak, the admiral, said to him: 'It is impossi-
ble to travel to the islands except after three months from
now.' The Sultan said to me: 'If that is so, proceed to Fattan3
so we can bring this expedition to an end. We shall return to
Mutra our capital4 | and the expedition will start from there.' 192
So I stayed with him and in the meantime did not send for my
slave-girls and companions.
Account of the Sultan's order of march and his abominable conduct
in killing women and children. The country through which we

3 This must represent pattinam, patnam, patam, etc., the last element in the
name of many ports in south India. Kaveripattanam and Negapatam (Nagapatti-
nam) were the most important on the Coromandel coast, but Yule and Cordier
suggest somewhere nearer to Madurai, e.g. Devipattinam (Cathay, IV, p. 35, n.
1).
4 Madurai.

859
 COROMANDEL, MALABAR AND THE MALDIVES

were passing was one jungle of trees and reeds such that
nobody could penetrate it. The Sultan ordered that everyone
in the army, whether high or low, should carry an axe for
cutting through it. When the camp was pitched he rode to the
forest accompanied by the troops, and they cut down trees
from morning till afternoon. Then food was brought and all
the people ate, one party after another. Then they resumed
cutting down trees till evening. Any infidel whom they found
193 in the jungle they took prisoner. They made | wooden stakes
sharpened at both ends and put them on the prisoners' shoul-
ders to carry. Their wives and children were with them and
they brought them to the camp. It is their custom to make
round the camp a wooden palisade with four gates, which they
call a katkar.* They make another katkar round the Sultan's
tent. Outside the peripheral katkar they make platforms about
half a man's height and light fires on them at night. The slaves
and sentinels pass the night there. Each of them has a handful
of thin reeds and when some of the infidels come to attack the
camp at night each one lights the bundle he has in his hand
and the night becomes like day from the brightness of the
illumination, and the horsemen ride out in pursuit of the
infidels.
In the morning the infidels taken prisoner the day before
194were divided into four groups which were taken to each of
the four gates of the katkar. The stakes they had carried the
day before were fixed in them and driven through them. Their
women were killed and tied by the hair to the stakes. The
little children were killed in their laps and left there.
[Another] camp was pitched, they busied themselves cutting
down more jungle, and acted in the same way with those they
made prisoners. This was an abomination which I have not
known of any other king. That is why God hastened his death.
One day the qao1! was seated on his right and I on his left,
and he was eating with us, and I saw an infidel brought to him
with his wife and seven year old son. He signed with his hand
to the sword bearers that they should cut off the man's head.
Then he said to them: 'Va zan-i u va pesar-i-u', 5 which means
'and his son and his wife' and their throats were cut. I looked
5 Persian.

860
 DEFEAT OF THE HINDUS

away from them | and when I arose I found their heads thrown 195
on the ground.
I was in his presence one day when an infidel man had been
brought to him. He said something I did not understand and
immediately some of his myrmidons drew their knives. I got
up at once and he said to me: 'Where are you going?' I said: 'I
am going to pray the afternoon prayer.' He understood and
laughed. He ordered his hands and feet to be cut off. When I
returned I found him wallowing in his blood.
Account of his rout of the infidels, one of the greatest victories of
Islam. Bordering on his country was an infidel Sultan named
Balal Diyau. 6 He was one of the principal infidel Sultans. His
army exceeded one hundred thousand and he also had with
him twenty thousand Muslims, | rascals, criminals and run-i%
away slaves. He wanted to get control of the country of al-
Ma'bar. The Muslim army there comprised six thousand
men, of whom half were excellent and the other half worthless
and of no use. They met outside the city of Kubban. 7 The
infidel routed them and they retreated to Mutra, their capital,
while he encamped at Kubban, one of the greatest and
strongest of the Muslim cities. He besieged it for ten months
and they were left with provisions for only fourteen days. The
infidel proposed to them that they should leave under safe
conduct and abandon the town to him. They said to him: sWe
must submit this to our Sultan.' He promised them fourteen
days [to do this]. They wrote to Sultan Ghiyath al-Dln about
their situation. He read their letter to the people on Friday.
They wept and said: 'We shall sell our lives | for God. If the 197
infidel takes that city he will come and lay siege to us. It is
better for us to die by the sword.' They pledged one another
to face death and they marched out next day. They took off
their turbans from their heads and put them on their horses'
necks, this signifying someone who is willing to die. They
placed the most valiant and bravest in the van, to the number
of three hundred. On the right they placed Saif al-Din Bahadur,
a scrupulous and courageous jurist, and on the left the malik

6 The Hoysala king Ballala III, whose capital was at Dvarasamudra (Dursa-
mand).
7 Konnanurkoppam.

861
 COROMANDEL, MALABAR AND THE MALDIVES

Muhammad the Silahdar (Sword bearer). The Sultan rode in

the centre with three thousand men. The remaining three
thousand he made the rearguard under Asad al-Dln Kaykhusru
the Persian. They made for the infidel's camp at the time of
the siesta when people were relaxing and the horses were at
pasture. They attacked it and the infidels thought they were
198 robbers | and came out against them in confusion and fought
them. Sultan Ghiyath al-Dln came up and they were dis-
astrously routed. Their Sultan wanted to mount his horse,
though he was eighty years old. Nasir al-Dln, who was the
son of the Sultan's brother, and who succeeded him as king,
seized him and was going to kill him, not recognizing him.
One of his slaves said to him: 'He is the Sultan.' So he made
him prisoner and took him to his uncle, who treated him
with apparent respect until he had extracted from him his
wealth, his elephants and his horses. He was promising to set
him at liberty, but when he had extorted everything he
possessed, he killed and flayed him, stuffed his skin with
straw, and hung it on the wall of Mutra, where I saw it
hanging.
Let us return to our story. I travelled from the camp and
reached the city of Fattan, which is a large and fine city on the
coast. Its harbour is wonderful. A big wooden pavilion has
199 been built in it, which stands on thick wooden piers | and is
reached by a covered wooden causeway. When the enemy
comes the ships in the harbour are moored by the pavilion, the
infantry and archers climb up to it and the enemy has no
chance. In this city is a fine mosque, built of stone, and there
are plentiful grapes and good pomegranates. There I met the
pious shaikh Muhammad of Naisabur, one of the distraught
faqirs, who let their hair grow down to their shoulders. With
him was a lion which he had brought up, which ate with the
faqirs and sat with them. He had about thirty faqirs with him.
One of them had a gazelle which was in the same place as the
lion, which did not attack it.
I stayed in the city of Fattan. Ajugf made pills for Sultan
Ghiyath al-Dln to give him strength in copulation. It was said
200 that the mixture | included iron filings and that he ate more of
them than was necessary and fell ill. When he reached Fattan
I went out to meet him and gave him a present. When he was
862
 DEATH OF SULTAN GHIYATH AL-DIN

established there he sent for the admiral, Khwaja Sarur, and

said to him: 'Concern yourself with nothing else but the ships
assigned to the expedition to the islands.' He wanted to give
me the price of my present, but I refused. I regretted it later
for he died and I received nothing. He stayed half a month in
Fattan, then travelled to his capital. I stayed half a month after
him, then travelled to his capital, the city of Mutra, a large city
with wide streets. The first to choose it as his capital was my
father-in-law the Sultan Sharif Jalal al-Dln Ahsan Shah, who
made it similar to Dihll and gave it fine buildings.
When I arrived there I encountered a plague from which
people died suddenly. Whoever | fell ill died in two or three 201
days. If death was delayed it was only till the fourth day.
When I went out I saw only the sick or the dead. I bought a
slave-girl there on the understanding that she was healthy, but
she died the next day. One day a woman came to me whose
husband had been one of the WazTrs of Sultan Ahsan Shah.
She had with her her son who was eight years old, talented,
clever and intelligent. She complained of her impoverished
state and I gave them a sum of money. They were both
healthy and fit. Next day she came asking for a shroud for the
aforesaid son who had suddenly died. At the time of the
Sultan's death I used to see in his audience hall hundreds of
servant-girls who had been brought in to pound the rice from
which food was made for others than the Sultan; they were ill
and had thrown themselves down in the sun. |
When the Sultan came to Mutra he found his mother, his 202
wife and his son all ill. He stayed in the city for three days,
then went to a river a farsakh away where there was an infidel
temple. I followed him on the Thursday and he ordered that I
should stay with the qacft. When the tents were pitched for me
I saw people hurrying and pushing against each other. Some
said: 'The Sultan is dead' and some said: 'It is his son who has
died.' We found out the truth; it was the son who had died
and he had no other. His death aggravated the Sultan's illness
and his mother died on the Thursday.
Account of the Sultan's death, of the accession of his brother's son,
and of my leaving him. On the third Thursday Sultan Ghiyath
al-Dln died. I learnt this | and hurried to the city fearing there 203
would be disturbances. I met Nasir al-Dln, his brother's son
863
 COROMANDEL, MALABAR AND THE MALDIVES

and heir apparent, on his way to the camp, to which he had

been sent, as the Sultan had left no son. He asked me to go
back with him but I refused, which made an impression on
him. This Nasir al-Dln had been a household attendant in
DihlT before his uncle reigned. When his uncle became ruler
he fled to him in the guise of a faqir. Fate determined that he
should rule after him. When allegiance had been sworn to
him, the poets eulogised him and he rewarded them gener-
ously. The first to rise and recite was the qao1! $adr al-Zaman;
he gave him five hundred dinars and a robe of honour. Then
came the Wazlr called Al-Qao1! to whom he gave two thousand
dinar dirhams. He gave me three hundred dinars and a robe of
honour. He distributed alms among the faqirs and the poor.
When the preacher delivered the first address in which he
204 mentioned his name, dinars and dirhams were poured on him
on gold and silver plates. The obsequies of Sultan Ghiyath al-
Dln were celebrated. The whole Qur'an was recited at his
grave every day. Then the 'ashshdrP recited, food was
brought and people ate. Then dirhams were given to everyone
according to his status. This continued for forty days. Then
they did the same every year on the anniversary of his death.
The first thing Sultan Nasir al-Dln did was to remove his
uncle's Wazir from office and demand his wealth. As Wazlr he
appointed the malik Badr al-Dln whom his uncle had sent to
receive me when I was at Fattan. He soon died and Khwaja
Sarur, the admiral, was appointed Wazlr. The Sultan ordered
that he should be addressed as Khwaja Jahan, like the Wazlr in
DihlT. Anyone who addressed him in any other way was fined
205 a specified number of dinars. Then Sultan Nasjr al-Dln
killed the son of his paternal aunt, who was married to the
daughter of Sultan Ghiyath al-Dln, and married her himself.
The Sultan was told that the malik Mas'ud had visited him
in prison before his death, so he killed him too. He killed the
malik Bahadur who was brave, generous and a distinguished
man. He ordered that the ships which his uncle had designated
for the expedition to the islands should be assembled for me
but then a fever, fatal in that country, attacked me. I thought it
meant death for me, but God inspired me to resort to the

8 Those who recited one of the ten portions into which the Qur'an is divided.

864
 1BN BAJTUTA REVISITS THE MALDIVES

tamarind, which is abundant there. I took about a pound of it

in water and drank it; it purged me for three days and God
cured me of my illness. I became disgusted with that city and
sought permission to leave it. The Sultan said to me: 'How
should you leave when not a single month is left before the
time for sailing to the islands? Stay till you are given every-
thing that the Master of the World ordered for you.' I refused
and he wrote on my behalf to | Fattan and found eight ships 206
going to al-Yaman in one of which I travelled. We met four
ships which fought us for a little while and then withdrew. We
reached Kawlam. I still had some of my illness left in me and
I stayed there for three months and then embarked on a ship
to go to Sultan Jamal al-Dln of Hinawr, but infidels attacked
us between Hinawr and Fakanur.
Account of how the infidels plundered us. When we reached the
little island between Hinawr and Fakanur9 the infidels came
out against us in twelve warships, fought fiercely against us
and overcame us. They took everything I had preserved for
emergencies; they took the pearls and rubies that | the king of 207
Ceylon had given me, they took my clothes and the supplies
given me by pious people and saints. They left me no cover-
ing except my trousers. They took everything everybody had
and set us down on the shore. I returned to Qaliqut. and went
into one of the mosques. One of the jurists sent me a robe, the
qao1! a turban and one of the merchants another robe. I learnt
there that the Wazir 'Abdallah had married the Sultana
Khadlja after the death of the Wazir Jamal al-Dln and that the
wife I had left pregnant had given birth to a male child. I
thought of going to the islands but I remembered the enmity
between me and the Wazir 'Abdallah. I opened the Qur'an
and found: 'The angels will descend to them saying "Do not
be afraid and do not grieve."' 10 I asked God's blessing and set
out. After ten days I reached the Maldive islands and landed |
in Kannalus. Its governor, eAbd al-'Aziz of Maqdashaw, zos
treated me with honour, offered me hospitality and prepared a
kundura for me. After that I reached Hululi which is the island
to which the Sultana and her sisters go to relax and swim. 11
9 Nitran or Pigeon Island.
10 Qur'an, sura xli, 30.
11 Hulule, now the airport.

865
 COROMANDEL, MALABAR AND THE MALDIVES

They call this 'going to the sea'. They play games on the ships
and when she is there the Wazirs and amirs send her presents
and gifts. I found there the Sultana's sister, her husband the
preacher Muhammad, the son of the Wazlr Jamal al-Dln, and
her mother, who had been my wife. The preacher visited me
and food was brought. One of the islanders went off to the
Wazlr 'Abdallah and informed him of my arrival. He asked
about me and about those who had come with me. He was
told that I had come to fetch my son, who was about two years
old. His mother came to the Wazlr and complained of this. He
209said | to her: 'I shall not prevent him from fetching his son.'
He importuned me to come to the [principal] island and
lodged me in a house opposite the tower of his palace so as to
be aware of my circumstances. He sent me a complete set of
clothes, betel and rose water as is their custom. I came with
two silk robes to throw down when greeting him. They took
them both from me but the Wazlr did not come out to receive
me that day. My son was brought to me, but it appeared to me
that it would be best for him to stay with them, so I returned
him to them and stayed for five days. I thought it best to
hasten my journey and I asked permission to leave. The Wazlr
summoned me and I went in to him. They brought me the
two robes they had taken from me and I threw them down on
greeting him, according to custom. He seated me beside him
and asked me about my circumstances. I ate with him and
washed my hands in the bowl with him, something he never
does with anyone. Betel was brought and I left. He sent me
210 robes and bustus \ of cowries and behaved as well as possible.

866
 CHAPTER XX

Bengal and Assam 1

left and we were at sea for forty-three days and then

I reached the country of Bengal. It is a spacious country,

producing rice in abundance. Nowhere in the world have
I seen cheaper produce than there, but it is gloomy and the
people of Khurasan say 'duzakhast pur ni'ma', 2 meaning 'it
is a hell full of blessings'. I have seen rice sold in the bazaars
there at twenty-five Dihll pounds for a silver dinar, which is
eight dirhams. Their dirham is precisely equal to the silver
ingot. The DihlT pound is twenty Maghribl pounds. I have
heard them say that it was a high price. Muhammad al-
Masmudl from the Maghrib, who was a truthful man, had
lived there formerly, and who died in my house in Dihll, told
me he had | a wife and a servant and used to buy provisions for 211
the three of them for a year for eight dirhams. He also said he
used to buy eighty DihlT pounds of rice in the husk for eight
dirhams. When it had been pounded fifty pounds net were
left, that is to say, ten qintars. I have seen a milch cow sold
there for three silver dinars; their cattle are buffaloes. I have
seen fat hens sold at eight for one dirham. Pigeon squabs are
sold at fifteen for a dirham. I have seen a fat ram sold for two,
a pound of sugar, the Dihll pound, for four, of julep for eight,
of ghee for four, and of sesame oil for two. I have seen a piece
of fine, high quality cotton, measuring thirty cubits, sold for
two dinars. I have seen a slave-girl, good looking and suited to

1 The character of I.B.'s narrative changes to some extent in this and the next
two chapters. He mentions few place names considering the great distances he
claims to have travelled in Bengal and China, two other countries which he says
he visited cannot be plausibly identified, and for various reasons some of what he
relates cannot possibly be true. The problem of chronology and authenticity that
arise will be discussed in vol. V.
2 Persian.

867
 BENGAL AND ASSAM

212 be a concubine, sold for a single gold dinar, which is two and
a half Maghrib! gold dinars. I bought a girl named 'Ashura of
outstanding beauty for about this price. One of my compan-
ions bought a pretty young slave boy named Lu'lu' (Pearl) for
two gold dinars.
The first city we entered in Bengal was Sudkawan, a very
big city on the shore of the Great Sea. 3 The rivers Kank, to
which the Indians go on pilgrimage, and jQn unite there and
flow into the sea. There are many ships on the river in which
they fight the people of the country of al-Laknawti. 4
Account of the Sultan of Bengal. He is Sultan Fakhr al-Dm,
surnamed Fakhra, an excellent Sultan, a lover of strangers |
213 and specially of faqirs and sufis. 5 The kingship of this country
belonged to Sultan Nasir al-Dln, son of Sultan Ghiyath al-Dln
Balban. 6 He it is whose son Mu'izz al-Dln was made king in
Dihli. Nasir al-Dln went to fight him. They met by the river
and it was called 'the meeting of two auspicious stars'. We
have already recounted this, and how he relinquished the
kingdom for his son and returned to Bengal, where he stayed
till he died. 7 Then his [other] son Shams al-Dln ruled till he
died. 8 Then his son Shihab al-Dln ruled until he was over-
thrown by his brother Ghiyath al-Dln Bahadur Bur. Shihab al-
Dln appealed for help to Sultan Ghiyath al-DTn Tughluq, who
helped him and took Bahadur Bur prisoner. Then when his

3 Identified as Satgaon (Satgamw) above Calcutta by Jadunath Sarkar, Ferrand

and others, but Mzik and Gibb prefer Chittagong (Chatgamw) which gives readier
access to Sylhet which seems to have been his objective. Neither place is on the
shore of the ocean. Satgaon is near the confluence of the Ganges and the Yamuna,
which does not here mean the great river which joins the Ganges at Allahabad,
but a stream connecting it with the Brahmaputra.
4 The ancient name of Gaur, often the capital of as much of Bengal as was
under Muslim rule. I.B. uses the name to designate the independent principality
ruled by 'Ala al-Dln 'All from Pandua, which had been renamed Firuzabad.
5 Fakhr al-Dln Mubarak Shah, the independent ruler of eastern Bengal from
Sonargaon (Sonargamw).
6 The history of Bengal at this time is obscure and confused and must be largely
reconstructed from fragmentary numismatic evidence. It has been evident from
his history of the Sultans of Delhi that I.B. was a careless historian (III, pp. 629-
56).
7 III, pp. 635-7.
8 It has been questioned whether Shams al-DTn Flruz can have been the son of
his predecessor Nasir al-Dln Mafcmud Bughra Khan, since none of his coins bear
the inscription sultan bin su/fatt, 'Sultan son of a Sultan'.

868
 WARFARE IN BENGAL

son Muhammad came to rule he freed Bahadur BQr on condi-

tion that he shared sovereignty with him. He reneged and
Sultan Mubammad fought him till he killed him. 9 Thereupon
he put a brother-in-law of his in charge but the troops killed
him. ] "All Shah, then in the country of Laknawti, took over214
the government. When Fakhr al-Dln saw that rule had passed
from the sons of Sultan Nasir al-Dln, whose client he was, he
rebelled in Sudkawan and in Bengal and made himself inde-
pendent. Fierce hostilities broke out between him and 'All
Shah. When winter came and the muddy season Fakhr al-Dln
invaded Laknawti by river, because he was strong there, but
when the dry season came eAli Shah invaded Bengal by land,
where he was strong. 10
Anecdote, Sultan Fakhr al-Dln's love for faqirs went so far that
he installed one of them as his deputy in the government of
Sudkawan. He was called Shaida. | Fakhr al-Dln went away to 215
fight an enemy and Shaida rebelled against him, wanted to
become an independent ruler, and killed his only son. When
he learnt this Fakhr al-Dln returned to his capital. Shaida and
his followers fled to the city of Sunarkawan, which is strongly
fortified. 11 The Sultan sent for troops to besiege it, but the
inhabitants, fearing for their lives, seized Shaida and sent him
to the Sultan's camp. They wrote to him about this and he
ordered them to send him his head, which they did. A large
number of faqirs were killed on his account.
When I first entered Sudkawan I did not see the Sultan of
the city and did not meet him, because he was in revolt
against the ruler of India, and I was afraid of the conse-
quences. I left Sudkawan for the mountains of Kamaru, a
journey from Sudkawan | of one month. 12 They are extensive 216
mountains which join China and also Tibet, where are the
musk gazelles. The people of these mountains are like
Turks. 13 They are strong workers and a slave of that race is
twice as good as a slave of another. They are famous for
resorting to magic and for their involvement in it. My object in

9 ill, p. 653.
10 'All's cavalry were useless in the rains.
11 Sonargaon.
12 The Kamrup district in Assam.
13 A reference to the Shan (Ahom) and related peoples.

869
 BENGAL AND ASSAM

going to these mountains was to meet a saint living there,

Shaikh Jalal al-Dln of Tabriz. 14
Account of the Shaikh Jaldl al-Dtn. This Shaikh is among the
greatest saints and most remarkable men, responsible for
famous miracles and wonderful achievements. He was an aged
man. He told me he had even set eyes on - God's mercy on him
- the Caliph al-Mustaesim billah the 'Abbasid in Baghdad
and was there when he was killed. 15 Later on his companions
217 told me | he had died at the age of a hundred and fifty and that
he had fasted for about forty years, breaking the fast only after
ten continuous days. He had a cow and used to break his fast
with its milk. He used to stand up all night. He was thin, tall
and had little hair on his cheeks. He converted the people of
those mountains to Islam, and that is why he stayed among
them.
One of his miracles. One of his companions told me that one day
before his death he summoned them, commended the fear of
God to them, and said: 'Tomorrow I shall leave you, if God
wills. My successor for you will be God, than whom there is no
other god.' Next day God took him when he prayed the noon
prayer, during the last prostration. Beside the cave where they
218 lived they found a grave dug | with a shroud and aromatics for
embalming. They enshrouded him, prayed over him, and
buried him there, may God have mercy on him.
Another miracle of his. When I was on my way to visit this
shaikh four of his companions met me two days' journey from
the place where he lived. They told me that the shaikh had
said to the faqirs who were with him: 'The traveller from the
Maghrib has come to you. Go and receive him.' They had set
out accordingly by his order. He had no knowledge whatever
of me; this had been revealed to him. I went with them to the

14 Jalal al-Dln of Tabriz, one of the founders of the SuhrawardT order in India.
He was particularly active in the neighbourhood of Lakhnauti and did not visit
Assam. By this time he had been dead for about a century. I.E. confused him with
Shah Jalal, the militant preacher responsible for the conversion to Islam of the
Sylhet district, now part of Bangladesh. R. M. Eaton has remarked that Bengalis
commonly make the same mistake (Ross Dunn, p. 263, n. 26). Even so it seems
strange that I.B. should have travelled from Madurai to Sylhet to meet someone
who had died about a hundred years before, and have spent three days there with
someone else whom he still supposed to be the man he wanted to meet.
15 In 1258, when the Mongols captured Baghdad.

870
 MIRACLES OF A SAINT

shaikh and came to his hospice outside the cave. There is no

cultivated land there. The people of the country, Muslims
and infidels alike, come to the hospice with presents and gifts,
and the faqirs and visitors feed on them. The shaikh has only
a cow | with whose milk he breaks his fast after ten days, as we 219
have already explained. When I entered his presence he rose,
embraced me, and asked about my country and my travels,
about which I informed him. He said to me: 'You are the
traveller of the Arabs.' One of his companions who was pre-
sent said: 'And of the non-Arabs, my master.' He said: 'And of
the non-Arabs. Treat him with respect.' They took me to the
hospice and gave me hospitality for three days.
Marvellous anecdote including miracles by him. The day he re-
ceived me I saw he was wearing a goat-hair farajiya, which I
admired. I said to myself: 'I wish the shaikh would give it to
me.' When I went to take leave of him, he rose, went to the
side of the cave, took off t\\e farajiya, and put it on me with a
skull-cap from his head. He put on a patched garment. The
faqirs told me that the shaikh did not usually wear j that 220
farajiya and had put it on only on the occasion of my arrival.
He had said to them: 'The Maghrib! will want thisfara/iya, an
infidel Sultan will take it from him and give it to our brother
Burhan al-Dln of $agharj, 16 to whom it belongs and for whom
it was intended.' When the faqirs told me that I said: 'I have
received the saint's benediction in that he has clothed me with
this garment. I shall not enter the presence of any Sultan,
infidel or Muslim, wearing it.' I left the shaikh and it hap-
pened that a long time after I entered the country of China
and reached the city of Khansa. I was separated from my
companions because of the great crowd. I was wearing the
farajiya. While I was in a certain street the WazTr appeared
with a huge cortege. He noticed me, summoned me to him,
took me by the hand, asked me about my arrival, and did not
part from me till we reached the house of the Sultan. I wanted
to leave him but he prevented me and presented me to | the 221
Sultan. He asked me about the Muslim Sultans. While I was
replying he looked at the farajiya and admired it. The WazTr
said to me: 'Take it off.' I could not refuse. The Sultan took it

16 See III, p. 677 and n. 89.

871
 BENGAL AND ASSAM

and ordered me to be given ten robes of honour, a fully

caparisoned horse and a sum of money. I was displeased about
this, but then I recalled that the shaikh had said that an infidel
Sultan would take it and I was much amazed. Next year I
went into the residence of the king of China in Khan Baliq
[Beijing] and sought the hospice of the Shaikh Burhan al-Dln
of Sagharj. I found him reading and wearing the identical
farajtya. I was astonished at this and fingered it in my hand.
He said to me: 'Why are you fingering it? Do you recognize it?'
I said: 'Yes. It is the one which the Sultan of Khansa took from
me.' He said: 'My brother Jalal al-Dln made this for me and
222 he wrote to me | saying "Thefarajrya will come to you by the
hand of so-and-so.'" Then he offered me the letter. I read it
and was amazed at how exactly correct the shaikh had been. I
told Burhan al-Dln the first part of the story. He said: 'My
brother Jalal al-Dln was greater than all that. He had power
over all that exists, but he has gone to the mercy of God. I
have been told', he said, 'that he prayed the dawn prayer
every day in Mecca and made the pilgrimage every year, for
he was absent on the two days of 'Arafa and the Feast and no
one knew where he had gone.'
When I had said farewell to Shaikh Jalal al-Dln I travelled to
the city of Habanq, one of the biggest and most beautiful
cities. 17 It is divided by a river which flows from the mountains
of Kamaru, called the Blue River, by which one goes to Bengal
and the country of al-Laknawtl. There are water wheels,
223 orchards | and villages on both banks as there are on the Nile in
Egypt. The people are infidels under Muslim protection. They
pay half of their produce and dues in addition. We travelled on
this river for fifteen days among villages and orchards as if we
were walking through a bazaar. There were innumerable ships
on the river and on each ship there was a drum. When two ships
met each one beat a drum and they greeted each other. The
said Sultan Fakhr al-Dln ordered that on that river no freight
charges should be exacted from faqirs and that provisions
should be supplied to any of them who was without them. If a
faqir arrives in a city he is given half a dinar.
17 The name survives as that of a small hill on the bank of the Chingra Khal
river, near Sylhet (Yule, Cathay, IV, pp. 151-5). Gibb (Selections, 366, n. 10)
contends that the Blue River can only be the Meghna.

872
 IBM BATT*OTA LEAVES BENGAL
After tra¥elling by river for fifteen days, as we have de­
scribed, we reached the city of Sunarkawan, the city whose
'the faqir Shaidi | when he had
there. When we arrived there we found a junk intending to go
to the country of al-Jawa18 which is forty days' sail away, on
which we embarked.

18 Not Jtvi but Sumatra, as often, though not invariably, in Arabic geographical
texts, Java Mul Jiwi.

873
 CHAPTER XXI

South-east Asia
e embarked and after fifteen days we arrived at the

W country of the Barahnakar who have mouths like

those of dogs.' They are sottish and do not adhere to
the religion of the Indians or to any other. They live in houses
of reeds roofed with dried grass on the seashore. They have
many bananas, areca palms and betel bushes. Their men are
like us except that their mouths are like those of dogs. Their
women are not like that and are of outstanding beauty. The
men are naked with no covering except that some of them put
their male organs and testicles in a painted holder made of
reeds and attached to their bellies. The women cover them-
225 selves with tree leaves. | There is a community of Muslims
among them. They are people from Bengal and at Jawa and
live in a separate quarter. They told us that they copulate like
beasts and do not hide what they are doing. A man has thirty
wives, more or less, and they do not commit adultery. If one
does commit adultery the penalty for the man is that he is
fixed to a cross till he dies, unless his friend or slave is fixed to
the cross in his stead, when he is freed. The penalty for the
1 Most commentators except Gibb and Tibbetts have treated this as a
toponym, but I.E. evidently refers to a people. They have not been satisfactorily
identified. The Andamanese, whom Marco Polo describes as having heads like
big mastiffs, and the Nicobarese have been suggested, but these are both incom-
patible with the elephants and the Muslim settlement. The direction and dura-
tion of the voyage from Sonargaon would indicate somewhere near Cape Negrais.
At this time Arakan was independent of Burma, and Sandoway and the coastal
area to the south were probably independent of Arakan, the capital of which was
in the Akyab district. Yule (Cathay, IV, p. 93, n. 1) remarked that 'Caesar Frederic
and some other sixteenth-century travellers' called the sea off Negrais the Sea of
Bara, but this is a misunderstanding. Bara, as used by Federici, Gasparo Balbi,
Bocarro and Fitch, is not a proper name, but the word for 'bar1 . As with Tawalisi
below, it is more relevant to identify sources from which I.B. could have taken his
descriptions than locations that would validate them.

874
 THE BARAHNAKAR

woman is that the Sultan orders all his household attendants to

copulate with her, one after the other till she dies, in his
presence. Then they throw her into the sea. This is why they
do not allow anyone from the ships to stay among them unless
he is settled there. They buy and sell only on the shore. They
bring water for the traffickers on elephants because | it is to be 226
had a long way from the shore. They do not allow strangers to
draw it themselves, being nervous about their women who are
attracted by handsome men. Elephants are plentiful among
them but only their Sultan can sell them; they are bought from
him for pieces of cloth. They have a strange language which
nobody understands unless he has lived among them and
revisited them often. When we reached the shore they came
to us in little boats each of which was a single log hollowed
out. They brought bananas, rice, betel, areca nuts and fish.
Account of their Sultan. Their Sultan came to us riding on an
elephant on which was a kind of pack saddle made of skins.
He was dressed in a goatskin robe, the hair on which was
turned outwards. On his head were three coloured silk fillets |
and in his hand was a javelin of reed. Some twenty of his 22?
relatives accompanied him on elephants. He sent us a gift of
pepper, ginger, cinnamon, the fish there is in the Maldives2
and Bengali cloths. They do not wear these but deck the
elephants with them on feast days. For every ship that docks
in his country he takes a slave-girl, a male slave, elephant
cloths, and gold ornaments which his wife puts in her girdle
and on her toes. If anyone does not give them this tribute they
use magic against him. The sea becomes rough for him and he
perishes, or almost so.
Anecdote. It happened that one night while we were in their
port a slave of the master of the ship, who had repeatedly
visited these people, left the ship | one night for an assignation 228
with the wife of one of their chief men in a place like a cave
on the shore. The husband knew of this and came to the cave
with a party of his friends, found them there and they were
taken to the Sultan. He ordered that the slave's testicles
should be cut off and he should be crucified. By his orders
people copulated with the woman till she died. Then the

2 See p. 823.

875
 SOUTH-EAST ASIA

Sultan came to the shore and excused himself for what had
happened. He said: 'We have to enforce our laws', and ex-
cused himself for what had happened. He then gave the
master of the ship a slave in place of the one he had crucified.
We left these people and after twenty-five days we reached
the island of al-Jawa [Sumatra], from which Jawl incense takes
its name. 3 We saw it at a distance of half a day's sail. It is green
and very well wooded with coconuts, areca palms, cloves,
229 Indian aloes, shakt, barki* \ mango, jamun? orange, and cam-
phor reeds. These people buy and sell with little pieces of tin
or unrefined Chinese gold. Most of the aromatics there are in
the part which belongs to the infidels; they are less common in
the part belonging to the Muslims. When we reached the
harbour the people came out to us in little boats bringing
coconuts, bananas, mangoes and fish. It is their custom to
make a present of these to the merchants and each of the latter
gives what recompense he can. The vice-admiral6 also came
on board. He inspected the merchants who were with us and
gave us permission to land. We landed at the port which is a
big village on the seashore with houses called Sarfra7 about
four miles from the town. Then Buhruz the vice-admiral
230 wrote to the Sultan | informing him of my arrival. The Sultan
ordered the amir Daulasa to come to meet me with the noble
qa^T Amir Sayyid of Shlraz and Taj al-Din of Isfahan and other
jurists. They came out accordingly and brought a horse from
the Sultan's stables and other horses. I and my companions
mounted and we entered the Sultan's capital, the city of
Sumupra, a fine, big city with wooden walls and towers.
Account of the Sultan of al-Jawa. He is Sultan Al-Malik Al-

3 Benzoin.
4 See III, p. 609, and n. 56.
5 Eugenia jambolana, Lamk., a small, sweet fruit, which the French translators
confused with the rose-apple, or jambu, Eugenia jambos, L.
6 Literally 'the deputy of the master of the sea', but Ferrand notes that the
official in question is the shdhbandar, who was in charge of policing the port,
collecting dues and often of presenting foreigners to the ruler (Relations de voyages
et texfes geographiques arabes, persons et turcs relatifs a rExtreme-Orient, II, 1914, p.
439, n. 6).
7 Not identified; the reading may be corrupt as there is no h in Malay. A
Muslim state had been established in northern Sumatra before the end of the
thirteenth century; it included the towns of Pasai and Semudera, the second
eventually giving its name to the whole island.

876
 THE SULTAN OF AL-JAWA

£ahir, 8 one of the noblest and most generous of kings, a

Shafi'I in madhhab, and a lover of jurists, who come to his
audiences for the recitation of the Qur'an and for discussions.
He often fights against and raids the infidels. He is unassum-
ing and walks to the Friday prayer on foot. The people of his
country are ShafVls who are eager to fight infidels and readily 231
go on campaign with him. They dominate the neighbouring
infidels who payjizya to have peace.
Account of our entry to his house and his generosity to us. When we
went towards the Sultan's house and were near it we found
spears fixed in the ground on either side of the road. This is a
sign that people should dismount and that no one riding
should go any further. We dismounted and went into the
audience chamber where we found the Sultan's deputy, who
is called 'Umdat al-Mulk ['Support of the Kingdom'] He rose
and greeted us. Their form of greeting is shaking hands. We
sat with him and he wrote a slip of paper to the Sultan
informing him about our coming, sealed it and handed it to
one of the pages, who brought the answer written on the back.
Then a page | brought a buqsha, which is a clothes bag. 9 The 232
deputy took it in his hand, took me by the hand and took me
into a little apartment they call a fardkhdneh™ a word like
zardkhdneh, except that the first letter is/. It was his daytime
rest room because it is the custom that the Sultan's deputy
comes to the audience hall at dawn and does not leave it till
nightfall. It is the same with the Wazlrs and great amirs.
From the buqsha he took three aprons, one of pure silk, one
of silk and cotton, and one of silk and linen, three pieces of
clothing which they call underwear, of the apron type, three
pieces of different types which they call 'middle-wear', three
woollen mantles, | one of them white, and three turbans. I put 233
on an apron in place of my trousers, according to their custom,

8 The Malay chronicle Hikayat Raja Raja Pasai calls him Al-Malik Al-Tahir.
N. J. Krom has shown that Al-Malik Al-£ahir was borne as an honorific title by
several rulers of Pasai (Hindoe-Javaansche Geschiedenis, 2nd ed., 's Gravenhage,
1931, p. 396). I.B. almost certainly refers to Ahmad who reigned from 1326 till
about 1360 (A. H. Hill, 'The Coming of Islam to North Sumatra', Journal of
Southeast Asian History, 4, 1963, pp. 6-21).
9 A Turkish word denoting a cloth or leather carrier for clothes, etc.
10 A Persian word for a small private room. For zardkhaneh see below p. 958 n.
48.

877
 SOUTH-EAST ASIA

and one of each kind of clothing. My companions took what was

left. Then they brought food, which was mostly rice, then a
kind of beer, and then betel, which is the signal for departure.
We accepted it, we rose, and the deputy rose when we did.
We left the audience hall and mounted. The deputy rode
with us and they brought us to a garden enclosed with a wooden
wall in the middle of which was a house, built of wood and
spread with the cotton velvet carpets they call mukhmaldt, 11
some of them dyed and some not. In the house were beds of
bamboo on which were counterpanes of silk, light quilts, and
the cushions they call balishts.™ We seated ourselves in the
house with the deputy. Then the amir Daulasa brought two
234 slave-girls | and two male domestics. He said to me: 'The
Sultan says to you that these are in accordance with our
means, not those of Sultan Muhammad.' The deputy then left
and the amir Daulasa stayed with me.
We knew each other because he had come to DihlT as a
messenger to the Sultan. I said to him: 'When shall I see the
Sultan?' He said: 'It is our custom that a newcomer does not
greet the Sultan for three days, so that the fatigue of the
journey has gone and he has recovered his faculties.' We
stayed for three days; they brought us food three times a day,
fruit and delicacies evening and morning. On the fourth day,
which was a Friday, the amir Daulasa came to me and said:
'You will greet the Sultan in the maqsura of the mosque after
prayers.' I came to the mosque and prayed the Friday prayer
235 with the chamberlain | Qayran. Then I went to the Sultan. I
found the qag1! Amir Sayyid and the men of learning on his
right and left. He gave me his hand, I greeted him, and he
made me sit on his left. He asked me about Sultan Muham-
mad and my travels. I replied. He then resumed the discus-
sion on jurisprudence according to the ShafTl madhhab. This
lasted till the afternoon prayer. After praying he went into a
room where he removed the clothes he was wearing. These
were jurists' clothes which he wears when he goes to the
mosque on Fridays on foot. Then he put on his royal robes
which are tunics of silk and cotton.

11 Presumably meaning carpets with deep pile.

12 A Persian word for a cushion or pillow.

878
 CERKMONIAL IN AL-JAWA

Account of his departure for his house and of the ceremony of greeting
him. When he left the mosque he found the elephants and
horses at the door. The custom is that when | the Sultan rides 236
on an elephant his escort ride on horses, and when he rides on
a horse they ride on elephants; the theologians are on his
right. That day he rode an elephant and we rode horses. We
went with him to the audience hall. We dismounted in the
usual place; the Sultan rode in. The Wazlrs, the amirs, the
secretaries, the officers of state and the army commanders
were ranged in ranks in the audience hall. The Wazlrs, of
whom there were four, and the secretaries made the first rank.
They greeted the Sultan and withdrew to their places. Then
came the rank of the amirs, who greeted him and passed on to
their stations. So did each category of people. Then came the
sharifs and the jurists, then his personal favourites, the scholars
and the poets, then the army commanders, then the pages and
the mamluks. The Sultan remained on his elephant opposite
the pavilion for assemblies. Above | his head a parasol en-237
crusted with precious stones was raised. There were fifty
caparisoned elephants on his right and as many on his left.
There were a hundred horses on his right and as many on his
left. They were Nubian horses. 13 His privy chamberlains
stood before him. Then male musicians came and sang before
him. Then came horses with silk coverings, gold anklets and
gold-embroidered silk halters and they danced before him. I
wondered at their performance; I had seen something similar
before the king of India. Towards sunset the Sultan went into
his house and the people went home.
Account of the rebellion of his brothers son and the reason for it. His
brother's son was married to his daughter and he made him
governor of a province. The youth fell in love with the daugh-
ter of one of the amirs | and wanted to marry her. It is the 238
practice there that if one of the people, whether an amir or a
commoner or whatever, has a daughter who reaches marriage-
able age, he asks for the Sultan's orders in respect of her. The
Sultan sends a woman who examines the girl and if the de-
scription she gives of her pleases him he marries her; if not, he
13 The French editors read nauba and translate 'chevaux de relais'; Ferrand
agrees. Dulaurier read nuba\ Nubian horses were much prized and were often
exported to South Asia.

879
 SOUTH-EAST ASIA

leaves her alone and her relations marry her to whomever they
wish. The people there are eager for the Sultan to marry their
daughters because of the prestige and honour they acquire
thereby. When the father of the girl whom the Sultan's
nephew loved applied to the Sultan he sent someone to ex-
amine her, and then married her. The youth's passion became
violent and he saw no way to obtain her. Then the Sultan
went on campaign; the infidels were a month's journey away.
His nephew rebelled against him and entered Sumupra which
239 at the time was without walls. | He laid claim to the kingdom.
Some people swore allegiance to him; others refused. His
uncle learnt of this and returned. His nephew took what
possessions and treasure he could, and the girl he loved, and
made for the country of the infidels in Mul Jawa [Java]. This is
why his uncle built the walls round Sumupra.
I stayed in Sumupra with him for fifteen days. After that I
sought permission to travel for it was the season, since the
voyage to China is not organized at any time. The Sultan
prepared a junk for us, stocked it with provisions, and was
most generous and kind, May God reward him! He sent one of
his companions with us to be host to us on the junk. We sailed
along his country for twenty-one nights. Then we reached
240Mul Jawa, which is the country of infidels. 14 It extends | for
two months' travel. It has aromatics, and good aloes of
Qaqula15 and Qamara. 16 both places being in the country. In
the country of Sultan Al-£ahir, in al-Jawa, there are only
incense, camphor, some cloves and some Indian aloes. The
greatest quantity of these occur in Mul Jawa. We shall relate

14 Java, at this time the centre of the Hindu empire of Majapahit. Yule's
contention that Mul-Jawa is the Malay peninsula (Cathay, IV, pp. 155-7) has been
refuted by Tibbetts (pp. 151-2).
15 There are references to this place in Arabic geographical works and travel
narratives but they are inconclusive and sometimes inconsistent. A Chinese
reference suggests that it was on the Tenasserim coast, which would imply that
I.E. visited it on his way to Sumatra, and that his description is out of place (P.
Wheatley, The Golden Khersonese, 1961, pp. 224-8).
16 Usually Qamar (i.e. Khmer), meaning Cambodia. Its history at this time is
confused and obscure, but there is no reason to think that it was subject to any
state in either Java or the Malay peninsula; the threat to Khmer independence
came from the Thais. Tibbetts suggests that Javanese rule over Tenasserim and
Cambodia 'is probably a fiction of the Javanese court', I.B.'s voyage coinciding
with 'the greatest period of Javanese expansion' (pp. 151-2).

880
 INCENSE, CAMPHOR AND INDIAN ALOES

about them what we have seen ourselves, have examined with

care and verified.
Account of the incense™ The incense tree is small, as tall as a
man or less. Its branches are like those of the artichoke, its
leaves small and thin. Sometimes they fall and the tree is left
with none. The incense is a resin occurring in the branches. It
is more plentiful in Muslim country than among the infidels. |
Account of camphor. 18 The camphor tree is a reed like the reed 241
of our country, except that the hollow tubes in which the
camphor is found are longer and thicker. When a reed is
broken the camphor is found inside the tube shaped like it.
The wonderful mystery about it is that there will be no cam-
phor in the reed until some sort of creature is killed at its root;
if this is not done there will be none at all. The best kind,
which attains the greatest degree of cold, a dirham's weight of
which is fatal because it congeals the breath of life, is called
among them hardala.™ A human being is killed beside the
reed. Young elephants replace human beings.
Account of Indian aloes. The Indian aloes tree is like the oak; 242
except that the bark is thin. Its leaves are exactly like oak
leaves. It gives no fruit, the trunk does not become very large,
and the roots are long and extend far. The aromatic smell is in
the roots; the wood of the trunk and the leaves have no
aroma. 20 In Muslim country every tree is private property, but
17 He is describing benzoin.
18 'The description here given of the production of camphor has no resem-
blance to the truth, and I suspect that he may have confounded with camphor
either something that he had learned about the Tabashir ... or siliceous concre-
tion found in bamboo-joints ... or Spodium, if that be not the same thing' (Yule,
Cathay, IV, p. 99, n. 3). Yule goes on to quote Crawfurd Descriptive Dictionary of
the Indian Islands: 'The Malay camphor tree ... is a large forest tree, confined, as
far as is known, to a few parts of the islands of Sumatra and Borneo, but in these
abundant. The oil ... is found in the body of the tree where the sap should be'.
Yule adds: 'The description in the text is yet more inapplicable to the Chinese
camphor'.
19 Yule comments: 'The word ... does not seem to be known. I suspect ...
tnat what he has got hold of is the Malay Artal, corresponding to the Hindustani
Hartal, 'orpiment' (Cathay, IV, p. 99, n. 3).
20 I am indebted to Dr David V. Field of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, for
the following comments on this passage: 'The species most probably involved ...
is Aquilaria malaccensis. In India the species most commonly producing this
product is Aquilaria agallocha. The aromatic resin deposited in the wood of these
species only occurs when the tree becomes infected by a fungus. The highest
concentrations occur in old trees which are sometimes said to look diseased. The

881
 SOUTH-EAST ASIA

in infidel country most of them are not. Those that are privately
owned are in Qaqula and these are the best aloes. It is the
same in Qamara which has the best kind of aloes. They are
sold to the people of al-Jawa for cloths. From Qamara comes a
kind on which an impression can be made, as if on wax. The
roots of the 'affds are cut off and buried in the earth for
months; they retain their strength and are some of the best
aloes. |
243 Account oj'the clove. The clove trees are of a great age and huge.
There are more of them in infidel than in Muslim country.
They are not privately owned as they are so common. What is
brought to our country is the wood. What people in our
country call 'the flower of the clove' is what falls from the
flowers and is like orange flowers. The fruit of the clove is the
nutmeg, known among us as the perfume nut. The flower that
is formed within it is mace. I have seen all this and been
witness to it. 21
We arrived at the port of Qaqula and found there an
assemblage of junks prepared for piracy and to fight any junk
which might oppose them, for a tax is imposed on each junk.
244 We disembarked and went to the city of Qaqula. It | is a fine
city with a wall of cut stone wide enough to take three
elephants. The first thing I noticed outside the city was
elephants with loads of Indian aloes wood which they burn in
their houses; it is the price of firewood among us, or even
cheaper. That, however, is when they sell it to each other.
When they sell to (foreign) merchants a load costs a robe of
cotton, cotton being more expensive than silk among them.

age, lack of vigour, etc., may have been responsible for the odd comment on the
lack of fruit. There is no good reason why these trees should not fruit under
normal conditions. The height of these large evergreen trees is given as from 40
to 80 feet and up to 8 feet in girth. One would expect the roots of most trees to be
long and to extend far. The tissues, including the wood, of uninfected trees have
no aroma. The leaves of Aquilaria species are similar to certain tropical species of
Quercus (oaks).'
21 I.B.'s botany is as unreliable as his history. The clove tree, Eugenia aromatica
L., is neither particularly long-lived nor particularly large. It does not live much
more than seventy years and grows to some 40 ft high, or more in the wild. The
branches tend to be erect so the shape of the canopy is roughly cylindrical. The
clove is the unopened flower bud. Nutmeg is the seed of another tree. Myristica
fragrans; mace is the integument of the seed.

882
PLATE I. A devotee visiting an ascetic. From Bundi, Rajasthan.
By courtesy of the Victoria and Albert Museum
PLATE II. A white elephant. From QazwInT, *Ajaib al-makhluqdt,
Royal Asiatic Society MS 178. See p. 851.
By courtesy of the Royal Asiatic Society
PLATE III. A gigantic bird carries off a woman. From QazwTnT, "Aja'ib
al-makhluqdt, Royal Asiatic Society MS 178. See p. 912.
By courtesy of the Royal Asiatic Society
PLATE IV. A black king. From Topkapi Saray Miizesi MS H 362.
See p. 958.
By courtesy of the Director, Topkapi Saray Miizesi
 THE SULTAN OF MUL-JAWA

Elephants are very common; they ride on them and use them
as beasts of burden. Everyone ties up his elephants at the
gate. Everyone who has a shop ties up his elephant beside it,
and rides it to go home and to carry goods. It is exactly the
same with all the people of China and Khipa. 22 |
Account of the Sultan ofMulJdwa. He is an infidel. I have seen 245
him outside his palace before a pavilion sitting on the ground
with no mat. The state officials were with him and the troops
paraded before him on foot. Nobody has horses there except
the Sultan. People ride elephants and they fight on them. The
Sultan learnt of me and summoned me. I came to him and
said: 'Greetings to whoever follows the true guidance.' They
understood only the word saldm. The Sultan welcomed me
and ordered a cloth to be spread for me to sit on. I said to the
interpreter: 'How shall I sit on a cloth when the Sultan is
sitting on the ground?' He said: 'This is his custom. He sits on
the ground as a mark of humility. You are a guest and you have
come from a great Sultan. You must be treated with honour.' I
sat down and he asked me about the Sultan (of India). His 245
questions were terse. He said to me: 'You will stay as our
guest for three days and then depart.'
Account of a wonderful thing I saw in his assembly. In this Sultan's
assembly I saw a man with a knife like a billhook. He laid it on
his neck and spoke at length what I did not understand. Then
he took the knife in both hands and cut his own throat. His
head fell to the ground because the knife was so sharp and his
grip of it so strong. I was astounded at what he had done. The
Sultan said: 'Does anyone do this among you?' I said: 'I have
never seen this anywhere.' He laughed and said: 'These are
our slaves and they kill themselves for love of us.' He ordered
the body to be carried away and burnt. The Sultan's deputies,
the state officials, the troops and the common people went out
to the cremation. | He granted ample pensions to his children, 247
wife and brothers, and they were highly honoured because of

22 It is difficult to believe that I.B. would have written this is he had really been
to China, but elephants were used extensively in the armies of the Mongol
emperors and sometimes figured in the tribute they exacted from countries in SE
Asia. Khifa, Cathay, refers to north China, not the part which remained under the
rule of the Sung dynasty until Qubilai completed the Mongol conquest of the
whole country.

883
 SOUTH-EAST ASIA

what he had done. Someone who had been present at that

assembly told me that what the man had said had been an
affirmation of his love for the Sultan, and a declaration that he
was killing himself for love of him, as his father had killed
himself for love of the Sultan's father, and as his grandfather
had done for love of the Sultan's grandfather.
When I had left the assembly the Sultan sent me three days'
guest rations. We set sail and after thirty-four days reached the
Sluggish or Tranquil Sea, which has a reddish colour; they
claim that this is because of the earth of the land which
bounds it. 23 It has no wind and no waves and no movement in
spite of its extent. For this reason every Chinese junk is
accompanied by three boats, as we have said. They are rowed
248 and tow it. Besides there are in every junk | about twenty very
big oars like masts. 24 Some thirty men assemble by each oar
and stand in two ranks facing each other. Two very big ropes
like cables are attached to each oar. One party pulls the rope
and then lets it go; then the other party pulls it. They sing
with fine voices as they do this, and usually they sing Laid,
lafld.
We sailed on this sea for thirty-seven days. The sailors were
surprised how easy was our voyage. They spend forty or fifty
days on it and that is regarded as favourable. Then we reached
the country of Tawalisi, where the king is called Tawalisl. 25 It
is a spacious country and its king is like the king of China. He

23 From the time of Khwarizml (ninth century), who calls it the Dark Sea,
Islamic geographers mention a sea with a more or less comparable name which
affords an opening to the circumambient ocean. Unlike Ptolemy they did not
regard Africa as joined to China by a continuous coastline. Mr Robert Nicholl
informs me that the great rivers of Borneo 'discharge vast quantities of brownish-
red laterite silt into the sea, and at this time, owing to the lack of defined currents,
it spreads outwards like an immense oil slick'.
24 Adopting Dozy's emendation tawanis for tawabis 'clubs', in the text.
25 This country has been very variously, but not satisfactorily, identified.
Candidates include Cambodia, Cochin China, Champa, Tongking, Celebes
(Sulawesi), Tawal island in the Moluccas, Brunei and Sulu. Yule, who suggested
the last, admitted to 'a faint suspicion that Tawalisi is really to be looked for in
that part of the atlas which contains the Marine Surveys of the late Captain
Gulliver' (Cathay, IV, p. 158). Professor Yamamoto would connect the name with
the princely title taval in use in Champa ('Tawalisi described by Ibn Battuta',
Memoirs of the Research Department of the Toyo Bunko, no. 8, 1936, pp. 93-133). Mr
Robert Nicholl suggests that it represents the Brunei title Dewa Lela Sura or the
shortened form Dewa Sura.

884
 PRINCESS URDUJA

has numerous junks with which he fights the king of China |

until they sue for peace on conditions. 26 The people of this249
country worship idols. They are of handsome appearance and
most resemble the Turks. Most of them have reddish colour-
ing. They are brave and intrepid. Their women ride horses,
understand archery, and fight just like the men. We anchored
in one of their ports in the city of Kailukari, one of their finest
and largest cities. 27 The king's son used to live there, but
when we anchored in the port soldiers came to us. The captain
disembarked to meet them and took a present for the king's
son. He enquired about him and the soldiers told him that his
father had made him governor of another place and had
appointed his daughter to that city. Her name is Urduja. 28 |
Account of this princess. On the second day after our arrival at 250
the port of Kailukan the princess summoned the captain, the
kardni, who is the secretary, 29 the merchants, the pilots, the
tandtl, who is the officer of the foot soldiers, 30 and the sipdh
sa/ar, who is the commander of the crewmen,31 to a banquet
she had prepared for them according to her custom. The
captain wanted me to attend with them, but I refused, for
they are infidels and it is not lawful to eat their food. When the
guests attended upon her she said: 'Is there any one of you who
has stayed behind and has not come?' The captain said to her:

26 There are only two states in the region of which this could conceivably be
claimed, Japan and Majapahit in Java, both of which had successfully repelled
expeditions sent by Qubilai Khan in the second half of the previous century.
27 No place name closely resembling this has been traced in south-east Asia,
but it is the name of a small port in south-east India which Gibb thinks I.E.
'afterwards transported to somewhere in the China Sea' (Selections, p. 366, n. 3).
Yamamoto sees it as an Arabic transcription of Klaung Garai (p. 117). Early in the
century the king of Champa built a temple to Po Klaung Garai at Phanrang. The
earliest Islamic monuments in SE Asia, dating from the eleventh century, occur
in this region, which was part of Champa (S. Q. Fatimi, Islam comes to Malaysia,
Singapore, 1963, pp. 42-60).
28 This Turcophone Amazon princess cannot be comfortably accommodated
anywhere in south-east Asia. I.E. has already given her name to one of the wives
of Ozbeg Khan. Mr Nicholl suggests that, 'since she was ruling as her father's
viceroy, she probably had the traditional Brunei title of Urdana Raja'.
29 The origin of Anglo-Indian cranny, used of clerks in public offices.
30 The Anglo-Indian tindal. The French editors interpret I.B.'s explanation as
meaning an infantry general, Dulaurier, Yule and Ferrand as referring to someone
in charge of the sailors, which makes better sense and agrees with its modern use
as equivalent to 'boatswain'.
31 Persian for the commander-in-chief of the army.

885
 SOUTH-EAST ASIA

'Only one man has stayed behind and he is the baksht, which
means qao!l in their language, 32 'and he does not eat your
food.' She said: 'Summon him.' Her bodyguards and the
captain's companions came and said: 'Obey the princess.' I
251 went to her. She was receiving in full state. Before her | were
women in whose hands were the registers which they dis-
played to her. Around her were women past child-bearing who
were her Wazlrs. They sat below the throne on sandal-wood
chairs. The men were before her. Her seat was covered in silk
and had silk curtains. It was of sandal-wood inlaid with many
gold plaques. In the assembly hall were benches of carved
wood on which were many gold vessels, both large and small,
such as amphoras, jugs and goblets. The captain told me they
were filled with a drink made from sugar mixed with aroma-
tics, which they drink after eating, that it smells pleasantly,
has a sweet taste, induces cheerfulness, sweetens the breath,
helps digestion, and enhances sexual intercourse.
When I greeted the princess she said to me in Turkish:
'Hasan misan, yakshl misan', meaning 'How are you? Are you
252 well?'33 She seated me near her. | She wrote Arabic well and
said to one of her attendants: 'Dawa wa batak katur', meaning
'(Bring) an inkwell and paper.'34 They were brought and she
wrote: 'In the name of God the merciful, the compassionate'.
She said: 'What is this?' I said: 'Tano!ari nam', 35 meaning
'That is God's name.' She said: 'Khushun', 36 meaning 'Good'.
Then she asked me from which country I came. I said: 'From
India.' She said: 'The pepper country?' I said: 'Yes.' She
asked me about that country and events there and I answered
her. She said: 'I must invade it and take possession of it. Its
wealth and its soldiers please me.' I said to her: 'Do so.' She
ordered that I should be given robes, two elephant loads of
rice, two buffalo cows, ten sheep, four pounds of julep, and

32 The French editors have qadi, which is an emendation. Another MS.,

followed by Dulaurier, reads faqih 'jurist', which seems preferable. The word
bakshi has had a strange history (see Hobson-Jobson, s.v. 'buxee'). At this time it
was used for a Buddhist priest.
33 These phrases had been used by Sultan Tarmashlrin in greeting him at his
camp in Transoxiana, see III, p. 557.
34 Davet ve bitikgetir, 'Bring an inkstand and writing paper'.
35 Tanrinam.
36 Hog.

886
 A WARRIOR PRINCESS

four mart.abans^ which are | big vessels,37 filled with ginger, 253
pepper, citrus fruit and mangoes, all salted with what is used
in preparing for sea voyages.
The ship-owner told me that this princess had in her army
women, serving women and slaves, who fought like men, and
that she goes out among her troops of men and women,
invades the territory of her enemies, is present at the fighting,
and engages the champions. He told me there was a fierce
battle between her and one of her enemies in which many of
her soldiers were killed and her army was on the point of
fleeing; she forced her way forwards and broke through the
armies till she reached the king against whom she was
fighting, pierced him with a lance thrust which caused his
death, whereupon his troops fled, and she brought his head on
a spear, which his family recovered from her | for much 254
treasure. When she returned to her father he made her ruler of
that city which was under her brother. He told me that the
kings' sons used to ask for her in marriage, and she used to
say: 'I shall marry only a man who fights against me and
defeats me.' They avoided doing this being afraid of the
disgrace if she were to defeat them.

37 Big vessels of glazed pottery.

887
 CHAPTER XXII

China
e left the country of TawalisI and after seventeen

W days of sailing very rapidly and comfortably with a

favourable wind we reached the country of China.
The Chinese clime 1 is extensive and is rich in resources,
fruits, cereals, gold and silver; no other clime in the world
compares with it in this respect. A river known as Ab-i haydt,
meaning 'the water of life', divides it, and is also known as the
Sabr, like the name of the Indian river. It rises in the moun-
tains near the city of Khan Baliq known as Kuh-i buznah, |
255meaning 'the mountain of monkeys'. 2 It flows through China
for a distance of six months' travel to finish at §Tn al-$In. 3 It is
encompassed by villages, cultivated fields, orchards and
bazaars, like the Nile in Egypt, but here there is more settle-
ment. There are many waterwheels. There is much sugar in
China, equal to Egyptian sugar or even better. There are
grapes and plums. I used to think that the fOthmdnf plum of

1 iqtim. The word is used here, not as by IdrisT to denote a latitudinal division
of the world, but as the Persian keshwar, one of seven regions among which Iran
was in the centre.
2 There is, of course, no such river; the great rivers of China flow roughly from
west to east. Peking was linked to Hang-chou by a canal, and much, though not
all, of the way from there to Canton could have been traversed by water. The
alternative name of the river appears in the text as Sabr, which the editors
emended to Saru, that being the name I.E. gives to the Indian river (see II, p.
274, III, pp. 726, 762) which he says has the same name. They understand this to
mean the Yellow River, the Huang-ho, sari being the Turkish for 'yellow'. In
another MS it is called the nahral-$in, 'the river of China'. Ab-i-hayat and Kuh-i-
buznah are Persian words, correctly translated by I.E. Professor Herbert Franke,
to whom I am greatly indebted for his comments on several passages in this
chapter, tells me that he knows of no river name in mediaeval China remotely like
Water of Life. He also notes that a Mountain of Apes anywhere near Peking is
highly improbable as no apes or monkeys are, or were, found there.
3 Canton.

888
 CHINESE PORCELAIN AND POULTRY

Damascus was unequalled till I saw the Chinese plum. There

are wonderful melons resembling those of Khwarizm and
Isfahan. All the fruits we have in our country are there as good
or better. Corn is very plentiful and I have seen none better.
It is the same with lentils and chickpeas. |
Account of Chinese pottery. Chinese pottery is made only in the 256
city of Zaitun and in $In Kalan. 4 It is made from an earth from
mountains there which burns like charcoal, as we shall ex-
plain. They add to it a stone which is found there and burn it
for three days. Then they pour water on it and it becomes
powdery again. Then they ferment it. The best is that which
has fermented for a whole month, but no more. What has
fermented for ten days is inferior. The price is that of pottery
in our country, or less. It is exported to India and other parts
of the world till it reaches our country in the Maghrib. It is the
most superb kind of pottery.
Account of the Chinese fowls. The hens and cocks of China are
very fat, | fatter than our geese. 5 Their hens' eggs are bigger257
than the eggs of geese among us. Their geese are not fat. We
bought a hen which we wanted to cook but it would not fit into
one pot; we used two. The cock in China is the size of an
ostrich. Sometimes its feathers fall out and a mass of red flesh
is left. The first time I saw the Chinese cock was in the city of
Kawlam. I thought it was an ostrich and was astonished. Its
owner said to me: 'In China there are bigger ones than this.'
When I arrived in China I saw the proof of what he had told me.
Account of some particulars of the Chinese. The Chinese are
infidels. They worship idols and burn their dead as the Indians
do. 6 The king | is a Tatar of the lineage of Tanklz Khan. 7 258

4 Ch'uan-chou (Quanzhou) and Canton. Zaitun has also been identified with
Chang-chou (Zhangzhou) near Amoy; this was exhaustively discussed by Pelliot
(Notes on Marco Polo, I, 1959, under 'Caiton'). The manufacture of pottery,
including porcelain, was far more widespread than I.E. supposed. $In Kalan is the
same as Sin al-$Tn.
5 This is nonsense, but I.B.'s contemporary Odoric of Pordenone remarks on
the size of Chinese poultry, including geese (Yule, Cathay, II, pp. 181-2).
6 At this time cremation, though not universal, as I.E. implies, was common in
China, especially in some of the coastal provinces (A. C. Moule, Quiasai, 1957, p.
50).
7 The ruling emperor was Toghon Temur (1333-70), the last of the Mongol
(Yuan) dynasty; he was eighth in descent from Chingiz Khan and was driven out
of China in 1368.

889
 CHINA

In every city of China is a quarter where the Muslims live

separately and have mosques for their Friday prayers and
other assemblies. They are highly regarded and treated with
respect. The Chinese infidels eat the meat of pigs and dogs
and sell it in the bazaars. They live comfortably and in afflu-
ence but take little care about their food and clothing. 8 You
will see an important merchant whose wealth is beyond reck-
oning wearing a tunic of coarse cotton. All the Chinese pay
attention only to gold and silver vessels. Every one of them
has a walking stick on which to lean when walking and they
call it the third leg.
Silk is extremely plentiful for the worms attach themselves to
259 fruit, eat it and need little care. This is why it is plentiful and
the poor and the destitute dress in it. If it were not for the
merchants [trading in it] it would have no value. Among them a
single robe of cotton is sold for the price of many of silk. It is the
custom that a merchant melts the gold and silver he has to make
ingots, each of them weighing a qintar, more or less. He places
it over the door of his house. Anyone who has five ingots makes
a seal-ring for his finger; anyone who has ten makes two rings;
anyone who has fifteen is called saft, 9 which means the same as
kdriml in Egypt. 10 They call a single ingot barkdla. 1 *
Account of the paper dirham with which they buy and sell. The
people of China do not do business for dinars and dirhams. In
260 their country all the gold and silver they acquire | they melt
down into ingots, as we have said. They buy and sell with
pieces of paper the size of the palm of the hand which are
stamped with the Sultan's stamp. Twenty-five such pieces are
called balisht, which is the same as dinar among us. 12 If these

8 This cannot be taken seriously. Chinese cuisine was elaborate and very
varied, though for religious reasons Muslims would have abstained from many of
the dishes. Clothing was of social significance, could be sumptuous and was
officially regulated in minute detail Qacques Gernet, La Vie quotidienne en Chine a
la veille de finvasion mongple, 1959, pp. 138-52).
9 Anglo-India 'chetty', denoting a member of any of the trading castes of south
India. Hobson-Jobson (under 'chetty') cites this as one of I.B.'s 'questionable
statements' about China.
10 A reference to the Karim! guild of merchants which dominated much of the
commerce of the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.
11 Persian pargala, a piece or fragment.
12 A Persian word, originally meaning 'cushion', later used for a gold or silver
ingot.

890
 CHINESE PORTRAITURE

pieces of paper become tattered from handling they take them

to a house which is like our mint and receive new ones
instead. 13 The new pieces are not given against payment of
any kind, for those in charge of this work receive regular
salaries from the Sultan. The amir in charge of that house is
one of the most important. If anyone goes to the bazaar with a
silver dirham or a dinar intending to buy something with it, it
is not accepted and he is disregarded until he pays with a
balisht and buys what he wants. 14 |
Account of the earth which they burn instead of charcoal. All the 261
people of China and Khita 15 use for charcoal an earth which
has the consistency and colour of clay. Loads of it are brought
by elephants and it is cut into pieces the size of pieces of
charcoal with us. They set it alight and it burns like charcoal,
but it gives off more intense heat. When it is reduced to ash
they knead it with water, dry it, and cook with it a second
time; they go on doing this till it is used up. From this earth
they make vessels of Chinese pottery, adding another stone to
it as we have related. 16
Account of the crafts in which the Chinese have special skill. The
Chinese are of all peoples the most skilful in crafts and attain
the greatest perfection in them. This | is well known and 262
people have described it and spoken at length about it. No
one, whether Greek or any other, rivals them in mastery of
painting. They have prodigious facility in it. One of the re-
markable things I saw in this connection is that if I visited one
of their cities, and then came back to it, I always saw portraits
of me and my companions painted on the walls and on paper
in the bazaars. I went to the Sultan's city, passed through the
painters' bazaar, and went to the Sultan's palace with my
companions. We were dressed as Iraqis. When I returned from

13 According to Marco Polo 3% of the value was charged.

14 'According to Yuan regulations, foreign merchants were required to convert
their precious metals into paper currency as soon as they set foot in China" (Morris
Rossabi, 'The Muslims in the Early Yuan Dynasty' in Langlois, J. D. (ed.) China
under Mongol Ru/e', 1981, p. 282).
15 Cathay, i.e. northern China, so-called after the Khitai, a semi-nomadic
people related to the Mongols, who ruled over northern China from the ninth to
the twelfth century as the Liao dynasty.
16 I.B. appears to have confused three substances, coal, kaolin and a mixture of
powdered coal and clay used as a cheaper substitute for coal.

891
 CHINA

the palace in the evening I passed through the said bazaar. I

saw my and my companions' portraits painted on paper and
hung on the walls. We each one of us looked at the portrait |
263 of his companion; the resemblance was correct in all respects.
I was told the Sultan had ordered them to do this, and that
they had come to the palace while we were there and had
begun observing and painting us without our being aware of it.
It is their custom to paint everyone who comes among them.
They go so far in this that if a foreigner does something that
obliges him to flee from them, they circulate his portrait
throughout the country and a search is made for him. When
someone resembling the portrait is found, he is arrested.
Ibn Juzayy said: 'This is like what historians relate about
the case ofSabur Dhu'l-Aktaf King of Persia when he went to
Rum in disguise and was present at a banquet given by the
king. There was a portrait of him on one of the vessels. One
of the attendants of Qaysar noticed it and that Sabur's portrait
264 was impressed on it. He said to the king: "This portrait | tells
us that Kisra is among us in this assembly." It was as he said
and what ensued is written in books.' 17
Account of their practice of recording whatever is in ships. It is the
custom of the Chinese that when a junk wishes to set sail, the
admiral and his secretaries come aboard and record the
archers, servants and sailors who will sail; the junk is then free
to leave. When it returns they come aboard again and compare
what they recorded with the persons [on the junk]. If one of
those recorded is missing they question the owner of the junk
about him, asking for proof that he is dead, or has escaped, or
whatever else it may be has happened to him. If he cannot
provide this he is arrested.
265 When they have done that they order the ship's master to
dictate to them a manifest of all the merchandise in it,
whether small or great [in value]. Then every one disembarks
and the customs officials sit to inspect what they have with
them. If they come upon any article that has been concealed

17 The story, of which there are differing versions, is related of the Sasanian
king Shapur II (309/10-379), but sometimes of other Persian rulers. He was called
'of the shoulder-blades' (aktaf) because he is alleged to have had the shoulder-
blades of prisoners-of-war dislocated or pierced so as to prevent them from using
weapons again.

892
 FOREIGN MERCHANTS IN CHINA

from them the junk and whatever is in it is forfeit to the

treasury. This is a kind of extortion I have seen in no country,
whether infidel or Muslim, except China. However there used
to be something like it in India, in that anyone detected with
an article which had evaded financial dues should be fined
eleven times the amount. Then the Sultan suppressed it when
he suppressed the dues.
Account of their way of preventing depravity among the merchants.
When a Muslim merchant | arrives in a Chinese town he 266
chooses whether to stay with one of the Muslim merchants
designated among those domiciled there, or in the funduq. If
he prefers to stay with the merchant his money is impounded,
the merchant with whom he is to reside takes charge of it, and
spends from it on his behalf honestly. When he wishes to
leave his money is examined and if any of it is missing the
merchant with whom he has stayed and to whom it was
entrusted makes it good.
If he wishes to stay in thefunduq his money is entrusted to
the master of \he,funduq who is put in charge of it; he buys for
the merchant what he wants on his account. If he wants to
take a concubine, he buys a slave-girl for him. He puts him in
a room of which the door opens inside thefunduq and he meets
the expenses of them both. Slave-girls are cheap in price, but
all the Chinese sell their sons and daughters, and it is not 26?
thought shameful among them. They do not all the same
compel them to travel with their purchasers, nor do they
prevent them if they wish to do so. So if the foreign merchant
wants to marry, he gets married, but there is no way he can
spend his money on debauchery. They say: 'We do not want
it said in the Muslim countries that they lose their money in
our country, and that it is the land of debauchery and fleeting
pleasure.'
Account of the protection they afford to travellers on their roads.
China is the safest and best country for the traveller. A man
travels for nine months alone with great wealth and has no-
thing to fear. What is responsible for this is that in every post
station in their country is 2i funduq which has a director living
there | with a company of horse and foot. After sunset or 268
nightfall the director comes to the funduq with his secretary
and writes down the names of all the travellers who will pass
893
 CHINA

the night there, seals it and locks the door of thefundug. In the
morning he and his secretary come and call everybody by
name and write down a record. He sends someone with the
travellers to conduct them to the next post station and he
brings back a certificate from the director of tiw&funduq con-
firming that they have all arrived. If he does not do this he is
answerable for them. This is the procedure in every post
station in their country from §In al-$In to Khan Baliq. In them
is everything the traveller needs by way of provisions, espe-
cially hens and geese. Sheep are rare among them.
Let us return to our journey. When we had crossed the sea
269 the first city to which we came was | Zaitun. 18 There are no
olives in it, or in the whole of China and India, but it has been
given this name. 19 It is a huge and important city in which are
manufactured the fabrics of velvet, damask and satin which
are known by its name and which are superior to those of
Khansa and Khan Baliq. Its harbour is among the biggest in
the world, or rather is the biggest; I have seen about a hun-
dred big junks there and innumerable little ones. It is a great
gulf of the sea which runs inland till it mingles with the great
river. In this city, as in all cities in China, men have orchards
and fields and their houses are in the middle, as they are in
Sijilmasa in our country. 20 This is why their towns are so big.
270 The Muslims live in a separate city. On the day I arrived | I
saw there the amir who had been sent to India as ambassador
with the present, had been in our company and had been in
the junk which sank. He greeted me and informed the head of
the customs about me, 21 and he installed me in handsome
lodgings. I received visits from the qao1! of the Muslims, Taj
al-Dm of Ardabll, a distinguished and generous man, from the
Shaikh al-Islam Kamal al-Dln 'Abdallah of Isfahan, a pious

18 Chii'an-chou.
19 It is the Arabic word for 'olive'.
20 This can have been true only of the more luxurious houses. Gernet quotes
the recommendation that only a sixth of the area of a given property should be
occupied by the dwelling, one half by water, and one third by plants (Gernet,
127).
21 dfwdn, 'the institution commonly known by that name in North Africa and
Egypt in all ports open to foreign commerce ... at one and the same time custom-
house, warehouse, lodging house and bourse for foreign merchants ... its control-
ler was one of the principal officers of the realm' (Gibb, Selections, p. 370, n. 11).

894
 ZAITUN

man, and from the important merchants, among them Sharaf

al-Dln of Tabriz, one of the merchants from whom I borrowed
money when I arrived in India, and the one whose dealings
were best. He knows the Qur'an by heart and recites it very
often. As these merchants live in infidel country they are
delighted when a Muslim arrives among them. They say: 'He
has come from the land of Islam', and give him the legal
alms22 due on their property so that he becomes as rich | as one 271
of them. Among the pious shaikhs there was Burhan al-Dln of
Kazarun who had a hospice outside the town23 and to whom
the merchants make the oblations made to Shaikh Abu Ishaq
of Kazarun. 24 When the head of the customs learnt about me
he wrote to the Qan, who is their Great King, 25 telling him I
had arrived on behalf of the king of India. I asked the head of
the customs to send with me someone to conduct me to the
province of $In which they call $In Kalan which is in his
jurisdiction, so that I could see it for myself while awaiting
what reply the Qan would give. He consented and sent one of
his companions to escort me. I sailed on the river in a boat like
the galleys in our country, except that the oarsmen row stand-
ing up in the middle of the ship. 26 The passengers are in the
prow and the stern. To shade themselves they spread over the
ship pieces of cloth made | from a plant of the country like 272
flax, but it is not that and it is thinner than hemp.
We sailed on this river for twenty-seven days. Every day
about noon we cast anchor in a village where we bought
whatever we needed and prayed the midday prayer. In the
evening we stopped at another village. It was like this till we
reached the city of $in Kalan, which is the city of §in al-$In. 27

22 'According to the Qur'an the legal alms are to be given to 'parents, kindred,
orphans, and the wayfarer'. The ... community at Zaytun was so wealthy that the
only one of these five classes to which the alms were of any value was the last'
(Gibb, Selections, p. 370, n. 12).
23 The devotee Burhan al-Dln the Lame, with whom I.E. stayed in Alexandria,
had prophesied that he would meet his namesake in China (I, p. 24).
24 See II, p. 319.
25 Qan, from Khaqan, designating the supreme ruler of the whole Mongol
empire; it is to be distinguished from Khan, a title of very much wider applica-
tion.
26 The text is defective; a word seems to have been omitted.
27 Not all of the journey from Ch'iian-chou to Canton could have been made by
water.

895
 CHINA

Pottery is made there and in Zaitun. Here the Ab-i Hayat river
enters the sea; it is called the Meeting of the Two Seas. It is
one of the biggest cities and the finest in respect of its bazaars.
Among the largest bazaars is that of the potters, whose wares
are exported to other provinces of China and to India and al-
Yaman.
In the middle of the city is a huge temple with nine doors
273 inside each of which is a portico with stone benches | on which
those living in the temple sit. Between the second and third
gates is a place where there are rooms in which blind people and
chronic invalids live. They are all maintained and clothed from
the endowments of the temple. There are similar arrange-
ments between all the other gates; there is a hospital for the
sick, a kitchen for cooking food, and there are physicians and
attendants in the temple. I was told that old men no longer
strong enough to earn their living are maintained and clothed
in this temple. It is the same with orphans and widowed
people without means. The temple was built by one of their
kings who made this city and the villages and orchards de-
pending on it into an endowment for its benefit. The portrait
of that king is in the aforesaid temple and people worship it. 28
In one part of this city is the town of the Muslims who have
there the congregational mosque, the hospice and the bazaar.
274 They have a qa^I | and a shaikh and in every town in China
there is a Shaikh al-Islam to whom all the affairs of the
Muslims are referred. There is also a qa^I who gives judg-
ments among them. I lodged with Aufrad al-Dln of Sinjar, a
distinguished, important and very wealthy man. I stayed with
him for fourteen days. Gifts to me from the qao1! and the other
Muslims came continuously. Every day there was a fresh
banquet to which people came in splendid skiffs29 with singers.
There is no city, either of infidels or of Muslims, beyond this
city. Between it and the rampart of Yajuj and Majuj is sixty
days' travel, as I have been told. 30 Wandering infidels live
28
'Canton has undergone many changes, and no temple now appears to corres-
pond precisely with that described' (Yule, Cathay, IV, p. 122, n. 1).
29 'ushdriyyun, long, narrow boats like those used on the Nile.
30 The Rampart of Gog and Magog, allegedly built by Alexander the Great to
protect the civilized world from northern savages, was usually located near
Derbend on the western shore of the Caspian, but was sometimes confused with
the Great Wall of China.

896
 A MYSTERIOUS ASCETIC:

there who eat the sons of Adam if they overcome them. 31 That
is why people do not pass through their country or travel to it.
I did not meet in that country anyone who had seen the
rampart, or had seen anyone who had seen it. |
A marvellous anecdote. When I was in $In Kalan I heard that 275
there was there a venerable shaikh over two hundred years old
who neither ate nor drank nor excreted nor had intercourse
with women, though his powers were intact, and that he lived
in a cave outside the city, giving himself to devotion. I went
to the cave and saw him at the entrance. He was thin, very
ruddy, showed the traces of his devotional practices, and had
no beard. I greeted him; he took my hand, sniffed it, and said
to the interpreter: 'This man is from one end of the world and
we are from the other.' Then he said to me: 'You have seen a
miracle. Do you remember the day you arrived at an island
where there was a temple and a man sitting among the idols
who gave you ten gold dinars?' I said: 'Yes.' He said: 'I am
that man.' I kissed his hand. He thought for a while and then
entered the cave and did not | come out to us again. It was as 276
though he regretted what he had said. We burst into the cave
after him but did not find him. We did find one of his compan-
ions who had a bundle of paper balishts and said to us: 'This is
your guest money. 32 Take your departure.' We said to him:
'We are waiting for the great man.' He said: 'If you were to
wait for ten years you would not see him. It is his practice that
he does not see again anyone to whom one of his secrets has
been made known. Do not suppose he has gone away from
you. On the contrary he is present with you.'
I was amazed at this and went away. I told the qao!i and the
Shaikh of Islam and Auhad al-Dln of Sinjar about what had
happened. They said: 'This is how he behaves with strangers
who come to see him. No one knows what religion he follows.
The one you supposed to be one of his companions was the
31 Marco Polo states that the people of'the kingdom of Fuju' (Fukien) eat the
flesh of men who have not died a natural death. It has often been assumed that
this refers to aboriginal mountain tribes, but there have been allegations of
cannibalism among Chinese, Mongols and Tibetans (Marco Polo, I, pp. 311-14,
n. 9, II, p. 225). The range of the Chinese cuisine, which included many items
repulsive to European taste and prohibited to Muslims by their dietary laws,
made it natural to ascribe anthropophagy to them.
32 See above, p. 895.

897
 CHINA

shaikh himself.' They told me that he had been away from

277 this country for about fifty | years and had come back a year
ago. Sultans, amirs and important people used to come and
visit him and he gave them presents according to their rank.
Faqirs came to him every day and he gave something suitable
to each one, though there was nothing to be seen in the cave
in which he lived. They said too that he told of things in past
years and spoke of the Prophet, God bless and give him
peace, and used to say: 'If I had been with him I would have
helped him.' He used to speak with the greatest respect of the
two Caliphs eOmar b. al-Khaftab and 'All b. Abl Talib and
praise them both, and used to curse Yazld b. Mu'awiya and
abuse Mu'awiya. 33 They told me many things about him.
Aufcad al-Dln of Sinjar said: 'I visited him in the cave. He
took my hand and I imagined I was in a vast palace and that he
278 was sitting on a throne with a crown on his head. On either
side of him were beautiful maidservants and fruits were drop-
ping into rivers which were there. I imagined I took an apple
to eat and suddenly I was in the cave, in front of him, and he
was laughing at me. A severe illness afflicted me and stayed
with me for months. I did not go to him again.
The people of that country believe he is a Muslim, but
nobody has seen him pray. As for fasting, he fasts perpetually.
The qacli said to me: 'One day I spoke to him about prayer
and he said to me "Do you know what I do? My prayer is
certainly not the same as your prayer."' Everything one is told
about this man is strange.
On the second day after meeting him I set out to return to
Zaitun. Some days after arriving there an order came from the
279 Qan for me to go to | his capital in security and honour, either
by river or by land as I wished. I chose to travel by river. A
handsome boat, one of those used by the amirs, was prepared
for me. The amir sent his companions with me. He and the
qatfl and the Muslim merchants sent us ample provisions. We
33 These particulars indicate the shaikh's stance with reference to the schism
between ShlTs and Sunnls. The former would not speak with respect of the
Caliph 'Omar, whom they regard as having usurped the caliphate which rightly
belonged to 'All. Sunnls, while accepting 'Omar, repudiate Mu'awiya, founder of
the Umayyad dynasty, for his opposition to 'All and execrate Yazld his son and
successor, holding him responsible for the death of'All's son Husain (see I p 46,
n. 140). ' P

898
 IBN BATTUTA MEETS A MAN FROM CEUTA

travelled as official guests, having our morning meal in one

village and our evening meal in another. After travelling for
ten days we reached the city of Qanjanfu, which is a big and
handsome city in an extensive plain. 34 Orchards surround it as
if it were the Ghupa of Damascus. 35
When we arrived the qacli, the shaikh of Islam and the
merchants came to meet us with flags, drums, trumpets and
bugles and musicians. They brought us horses which weaso
mounted. Except for the qa^I and the shaikh they walked in
front of us and did not ride with us. The amir of the town and
his attendants came out to meet us for the Sultan's guest is
treated by them with the utmost respect. We entered the city,
which has four walls. Between the first and second walls live
the Sultan's slaves, both the city guards and the night watch-
men. The latter are called ba$wanan. 3(> Between the second and
third walls are the cavalry and the amir who governs the town.
The Muslims live within the third wall and there we alighted
with their shaikh Zahlr al-Dln al-Qurlani. The Chinese live
inside the fourth wall. It is the biggest of the four cities. The
distance from each gate to the next | is three to four miles. As 281
we have said everyone has his orchard, his house and his field.
Anecdote. One day when I was in the house of £ahlr al-Dln al-
Qurlam a big ship arrived belonging to one of the jurists most
highly regarded by them. I was asked if I would receive him
and they said: 'Maulana Qiwam al-Dln of Ceuta.' I was sur-
prised at his name but when we conversed after our formal
greetings it occurred to me that I knew him. I looked at him
for a long time. He said: 'I see you looking at me as though
you knew me.' I said: Which country are you from?' He said:
'From Ceuta.' I said: 'I am from Tangier.' He greeted me
again and wept and I wept too. I said: 'Have you been to
India?' He said: 'Yes, I have been to the capital Dihli.' When
he said that to me | I remembered him and said: 'Are you al-282
Bushri!' He said: 'Yes.' He had come to Dihli with his maternal

34 Gibb argues that, because of its size, the fact that it was evidently accessible
to ships, and its position on the way to Hang-chou, Fu-chou is *the most natural
identification' (Selections, p. 371, n. 19). Other cities have been suggested because
their names resemble Qanjanfu, but they are remote from any conceivable route.
35 The fertile plain around Damascus. See I, p. 119.
36 Persian pdsbdnan, 'watchmen'.

899
 CHINA

uncle Abu'1 Qasim of Murcia. He was then young and beard-

less but one of the ablest students; he had memorized the
Afuwafta'. 37 I had told the Sultan of India about him and he
had given him three thousand dinars and asked him to remain
with him. He had refused and intended to go to China where
he prospered and acquired considerable wealth. He told me
he had about fifty male and as many female slaves. He gave
me two of each and many presents. Later on I met his brother
in the country of the Blacks. 38 How far apart they were!
I stayed in Qanjanfu for fifteen days and then left. China,
for all its magnificence, did not please me. I was deeply
depressed by the prevalence of infidelity and when I left my
283 lodging I saw | many offensive things which distressed me so
much that I stayed at home and went out only when it was
necessary. When I saw Muslims it was as though I had met my
family and my relatives. This jurist al-Bushn with extreme
kindness travelled with me for four days when I left Qanjanfu
until I reached Baiwam QufJu, a small town populated by
Chinese, both soldiers and common people. 39 There are no
Muslims there except four households of agents of the said
jurist. We stopped at the house of one of them and stayed with
him for three days. Then I said good-bye to the jurist and
departed.
We sailed on the river in the same way, taking our morning
meal in one village and our evening meal in another, until
284 after seventeen days we reached | the city of al-Khansa. 40 Its
name is almost that of the poetess Khansa,41 but I do not know
whether it is Arabic or just coincides with Arabic. It is the
biggest city I have seen on the face of the earth. It takes three
days to cross it, the traveller journeying on and stopping [for
37 'The well trodden path', the famous collection of the sayings of the Prophet
Muhammad compiled by Malik b. Anas, after whom is named the MalikI madh-
hab, to which I.E. himself adhered.
38 See below, p. 946.
39 'It is quite possible that it was not a place-name at all, but the name of some
Turko-Tatar commander (? Bayan Qutlugh = "Bayan the Lucky") which Ibn
Battuta erroneously took to be the name of a town' (Gibb, Selections, p. 371, n.
21). Bayan was the name of one of the principal generals who conquered southern
China for Qubilai. Another Bayan was an important minister of Toghon Terniir,
the reigning emperor at the time of I.B.'s visit.
40 Hang-chou, Marco Polo's Kinsai.
1 The most famous Arabic poetess, born in the late sixth century.

900
 KHANSA

the night] in the city. It is laid out as we have described in the

Chinese style of building, everyone having his own orchard
and house. 42 It is divided into six cities which we shall
describe.43 When we arrived the qa^I Afkhar al-Dm, 44 the
Shaikh al-Islam and the descendants of 'Othman b. 'Affan the
Egyptian, who are the most prominent of the Muslims there,
came out to meet us with a white standard, drums, trumpets
and bugles. The amir of the city also came out with his
cavalcade.
We entered the city, which is really six cities each with its
own walls, while the whole is surrounded by one wall. 45 In the
first city live the city guards and their commander. The q
and others told me there were twelve thousand of them on the
military register. We spent the night after our entry into the
city in the house of their commander. On the second day we
entered the second city by the gate known as the Jews' Gate. 46
In it live Jews, Christians, and Turks who worship the sun and
are very numerous. The commander of this city is Chinese.
We spent the second night with him. On the third day we
entered the third city which is inhabited by Muslims. It is a
fine city and the bazaars are laid out as in Muslim countries.
There are mosques and muezzins, whom we heard giving the
call to the noon prayer as we entered. We alighted at the
house of the descendants of 'Othman b. 'Affan the Egyptian.
He was one of the important merchants who became fond of

42 This is contradicted by I.B.'s contemporary, Odoric of Pordenone, who

states that 'there is not in it a span of ground which is not well peopled' (Yule,
Cathay, II, p. 104).
43 Medieval Chinese cities were usually divided into quarters separated by low
walls. Hang-chou had more than six such quarters (Franke).
44 Other MSS read Fakhr al-Dln.
45 It is impossible to reconcile I.B.'s description with the Chinese accounts
analysed, and the maps reproduced, by Moule (Quinsai and Other Notes on Marco
Polo, 1957). Yule remarked that there were 'several very questionable statements'
in I.B.'s account (Cathay, IV, p. 130, n. 1). Ross Dunn calls it 'cursory, blurred,
and defective' (p. 260). Moule estimated the greatest extent of the disused outer
wall at perhaps fifteen miles; the Mongols had forbidden the building of city walls
and those in existence were perhaps being quarried for building stones by the
inhabitants (Moule, 13). It is strange that I.E. makes no mention of the famous
lake.
46 Though the term Jews' Gate is not known from Chinese sources, there was
a Jewish community at Hang-chou, attested for 1335-40. The officials of the state
sugar monopoly were mostly rich Jewish or Muslim merchants (Franke).

901
 CHINA

286 this city and settled here. | The city itself was named after
him. His posterity inherited the respect and dignity he had
enjoyed, while they had their ancestor's predilection for faqirs
and benevolence to the needy. They have a hospice called the
'Othmanlya, handsomely built and well endowed. There is a
band of Sufis there. The said 'Othman built the congregational
mosque in this city and bestowed on it and on the hospice vast
endowments. The number of Muslims here is great. We
stayed with them for fifteen days; every day and night we
attended a fresh banquet. They always paid much attention to
the food they offered. Every day they rode out with us on
pleasurable excursions in the quarters of the city. One day
they rode with me into the fourth city, which is where the
government house is and the house of the great amir Qurpay. 47
When we passed through the gate my companions left me
28? and I was received | by the Wazlr who went with me to the
palace of the great amir Qurpay. I have already related how he
took from me thefara/tya given me by the saint Jalal al-Dln of
Shiraz. 48 This (fourth) city is reserved for the dwellings of the
Sultan's slaves and attendants. It is the finest of the six cities
and three streams run through it. One is a canal which runs
from the big river and on it small boats bring to the city
supplies of food and stones for burning. There are also pleasure
boats. The citadel is in the middle of the city and is very big.
The government office is in the middle of the citadel which
surrounds it on all sides. 49 In it are arcades where artisans
make precious robes and weapons. The amir Qurpay told me
there were one thousand six hundred master craftsmen, each
288 one of whom | had three or four apprentices working under
him. They are all slaves of the Qan and have fetters on their
legs. They live outside the palace and are allowed to go to the
city bazaars, but not to go outside the gate. They are paraded
before the amir every day, a hundred at a time, and if one of
them is missing his foreman is responsible for him. The
47 Professor Franke identifies him as Hu-la-t'ai (Mongolian Quratai) who was
made vice-chancellor (p'ing-changcheng-shiti) of Chiang-che province in 1329, after
having previously held a similar post in Hu-kuang. He was the eldest son of
Yesiider (Ye-su-te-erh), a Mongol of the Uriyangqai clan.
48 See pp. 871-2, where the donor is called Jalal al-Dln of Tabriz.
49 The governor's residence was not in the centre, but at the southern end of
the city.

902
 A PERSIAN SONG

practice is that when one of them has served for ten years his
fetters are taken off and he chooses whether to stay in service
unfettered, or to go where he pleases in the Qan's territory,
which he may not leave. If he attains the age of fifty he is
freed from work and he is supported. So it is with anyone else
who attains this age or thereabouts. Anyone who attains the
age of sixty is considered as a minor and legal penalties are not
applied to him. In China old men are treated with very great
respect. One of them is called ata, meaning father. 50 |
Account of the great amir Qur(ay. He is the supreme commander 289
in China. He gave us hospitality in his house. He gave a
reception which they call tuwa31 at which the principal men of
the city were present. He brought Muslim cooks to kill the
animals and cook the meat. For all his high rank this amir
brought us the food and carved the meat with his own hand.
We stayed as his guests for three days. He sent his son with us
onto the canal on which we sailed in a ship like a fire-ship.
The amir's son sailed in another with musicians and singers
who sang in Chinese, Arabic and Persian. The amir's son
much admired the Persian songs. They sang a song which he
made them repeat time and again so that I learnt it by heart. It
has a wonderful tune. Here is is:
Ta dil bamilinat dadim 290
Dar bahr-i fikr uftadTm
Chun dar namaz istadim
Qawl bimihrab andarlm52
A large number of ships assembled on that canal with coloured
sails and silk awnings and the ships were painted with great
skill. They attacked one another throwing oranges and
lemons. In the evening we returned to the amir's house and
spent the night there. The musicians came and sang all kinds
of attractive songs.
Anecdote of the conjuror. That night a conjuror who | was one of 291

50 Turkish ata, 'father'.

51 See III, p. 561, n. 78.
52 When we gave our hearts to sorrow
We sank in an ocean of care,
But we were stalwart when standing
Upright at the mihrab in prayer. (Persian) The verses are by Sa'cll (d. 1292).

903
 CHINA

the Qan's slaves was present. The amir said to him: 'Show us
some of your tricks.' He took a wooden ball in which were
holes through which were long cords. He threw it up and it
rose till it disappeared from sight, for we were in the (court-
yard) in the middle of the citadel, this being the last season of
intense heat. When only a little of the cord was left in his hand
he ordered an apprentice of his to cling to it and climb up till
he disappeared. The conjuror called to him three times and he
did not answer. Then he took a knife in his hand as if he were
infuriated and climbed up the cord till he too disappeared.
Then he threw down to the ground the youth's hand, then his
foot, then his other hand, then his other foot, then his trunk,
then his head. Then he came down, panting and his robe
bloodstained. He kissed the ground in front of the amir and
spoke to him in Chinese. The amir told him to do something
292 and he took the youth's limbs, | attached them to each other,
kicked him with his foot, and he stood up intact. 53 I was
amazed at this and suffered palpitation of the heart like what I
had had with the king of India when I had seen the same kind
of thing. They poured out a medicine for me which relieved
me. The qao!l Afkhar al-Din was at my side and said: 'By God
there was no climbing up or down or cutting off of limbs. It is
all conjuring.'
Next day we passed through the gate of the fifth city, which
is the biggest and is inhabited by the common people. It has
fine bazaars and skilful craftsmen. In it are made the fabrics
called Khansawiya. Among the wonderful things made there
are dishes called dost. They are made from reeds, pieces of
which are fitted together very skilfully. 54 They are given a
293 shining red tincture. Ten of these dishes | are fitted together,
each one in the hollow of another so finely that they look as if
they were one dish. They make a lid which covers them all.
They make platters which have remarkable properties; they
53 A very similar display in described and illustrated in Eduward Meltons... Zee-
en Land-Reizen, Amsterdam, 1681, pp. 468-9. See frontispiece.
54 Dost is Persian, not Chinese, and is the usual word for 'hand'. Professor
Franke cites a reference to an imperial wine cup shaped like a bowl for vegetables
and provided with a shou pa-tzu, shou meaning 'hand' and pa-tzu 'handle', and
suggests that I.B.'s use of dast may be a reflection of the Chinese word. He
remarks that 'already under the Sung Hang-chou had famous workshops for
lacquer'.

904
 KHITA

can fall from a great height without breaking and hot food can
be put in them without their colours changing or being
spoiled. They are exported to India, Khurasan and elsewhere.
After we had gone into this city we spent a night as guests
of its governor. Next day we passed through the gate called
kashfiwanan into the sixth city, in which live the sailors, fisher-
men, caulkers, carpenters, who are called dudkaran, sipahls,
who are the archers, and the piyada, who are the infantry. 55
They are all the Sultan's slaves; no others live with them and
they are very numerous. This city is on the bank of the great 294
river. We spent the night there as the guests of the governor.
Amir Qurpay had prepared for us a boat with all needful
provisions and other supplies and sent his companions with us
to ensure that we received hospitality. We left this city, which
is the last province of China, and entered the country of
Khipa. 56
Khipa is the finest country in the world in respect of cultiva-
tion, for there is no place in its whole extent which is unculti-
vated. The inhabitants or their neighbours are responsible for
paying the land tax. Orchards, villages and cultivated fields
are ranged on both sides of the river from the city of Khansa to
the city of Khan Baliq, which is sixty-four days' travel. 57 In it
there are no Muslims except for casual passers-by who do not

55 The foreign words are not Chinese but Persian, and are properly kashfibdndn,
dorvdgaran, sepd/iiydn, and peyddeh. The translations are correct, except that a
sepdhi is a soldier or a cavalryman, rather than an archer. However, mounted
archers were the most important element in Mongol and Turkish armies. Con-
cerning the Sailors' Gate Professor Franke writes: 'The gate cannot have been on
the inland side of the city but must have been on the eastern side, facing the
Ch'ien-t'ang River from where the merchant ships came. One of the eastern gates
was called Hou-ch'ao men "Gate for awaiting the tide". This gate is frequently
mentioned in 13th-century descriptions of Hang-chou ... We learn ... that there
was a brothel near this gate ... Close to the gate was also located a postal station
where the foreign envoys were lodged ... All this suggests that the "Gate for
awaiting the tide" was in a part of Hang-chou frequented by foreign travellers,
such as I.B.'s informants. My remarks are of course quite hypothetical because
the name ... is nowhere attested in Chinese sources but the identity is perhaps
not improbable'.
56 Cathay, northern China. Early in the tenth century China came to be
divided between the south, ruled from Hang-chou by the Sung dynasty, and the
north, ruled successively by the Liao and then Chin dynasties. The Mongols
completed the conquest of the Chin in 1234, of the Sung in 1279. By 'China' ($fn)
I.B. sometimes means the whole empire, sometimes the south only.
57 'Khan's city', the Turkish name for Peking.

905
 CHINA

have a home there, for it is not suited to fixed residence [for

295them]. There is no populated city, | only villages and open
spaces with grain, fruit and sugar [growing]. 58 I have not seen
anything like it in the world except for the four days' travel
from al-Anbar to 'Ana. 59 Every night we stopped at a village
and received hospitality until we reached the city of Khan
Baliq, also called KhaniqQ. 60 It is the Qan's capital and the
Qan is their supreme Sultan whose dominion is China and
Khipa. When we were ten miles away we anchored, as is their
custom. A written report on us was sent to the naval comman-
ders who allowed us to enter the port, which we did. After-
wards we stopped in the city which is one of the largest in the
world. It is not laid out as in China with orchards inside it, but
296 as in other | countries, with them outside. The Sultan's city is
in the middle like a citadel, as we shall explain. I stayed with
shaikh Burhan al-Dln of $agharj. It is he to whom the king of
India sent forty thousand dinars with an invitation, but he
accepted the dinars, and discharged his debts, but refused to
go to him. 61 He went to China, where the Qan made him head
of all Muslims in the country and gave him the title $adr al-
Jahan.
Account of the Sultan of China and Khi(a called the Qan. Qan is the
designation of whoever governs the kingdom and rules its
[different] regions, as whoever rules the lands of the Lur it
called Atdbak. bz His name is Pashay. 63 The infidels have no
kingdom bigger than his on the face of the earth.
297 Account of his palace. His palace is in the middle of the city
designated for his residence. It is built mostly of carved wood.
It is admirably planned and has seven gates. At the first gate
sits the kutwdl who is in charge of the gatekeepers. To the
right and left of the gate are raised benches on which sit the
58 'The alleged absence of cities on the banks of the canal is so contrary to fact,
that one's doubts arise whether Ibn Batuta could have travelled beyond Hang-
chau' (Yule, Cathay, IV, p. 137, n. 2).
59 Towns on the Euphrates, about 120 miles apart.
60 No name for Peking that resembles this has been traced. However, by
omitting one dot it can be read as Khanfu, a name used by Arab writers for Canton
and K'an-p'u, Marco Polo's Ganfu, which was then confused with Hane-chou
61 See III, p. 677.
62 See II, p. 288, n. 60.
63 Probably a corruption of the Persian title Padshah. The emperor's Mongol
name was Toghon Temiir.

906
 PALACE OF THK QAN

who guard the palace gate. There are five

hundred of them and I was told that in former times there
used to be a thousand. At a second gate sit the sepahis, who
are the archers and number five hundred. At the third gate sit
the nizeddris, who are the spearmen and number five hundred.
At the fourth gate sit the tighdaris, who are men with swords
and shields. In the fifth gate is the office of the WazTr with
many galleries. | The WazTr sits in the biggest on an imposing 298
elevated seat which they call the place of the throne. In front
of the Wazlr is a big gold inkstand. This faces the gallery of
the confidential secretary. To the right of this is the gallery of
the secretaries for correspondence. To the right of the Wazlr's
gallery is that of the secretaries for finances. Opposite these
are four other galleries. One of them is called the office of
control, in which sits the Controller. The second is the office
of the mustakhraj. Its director is one of the great amirs. It is
concerned with what is payable by the officials and amirs in
respect of their fiefs. The third is the office of appeals, in
which sits one of the great amirs with jurists and secretaries.
Anyone who has suffered an injustice appeals to them. The
fourth is the office of the post, in which sits the controller of
the reporters of news. At the sixth gate of the palace sit | the 299
janddris and their supreme commander. At the seventh gate
sit the eunuchs, who have three galleries, one for the Abyssin-
ians, the second for the Indians, and the third for the Chinese.
Each of these corps has a Chinese officer. 64
Account of the Qdn's expedition to fight the son of his paternal uncle
and of how he was killed. When we arrived at the capital, Khan
Baliq, we found the Qan was away. He had gone to encounter
the son of his paternal uncle, Flruz,65 who had rebelled against
64 The palace was burnt about the end of the century. Like so many oriental

palaces it seems to have consisted of three concentric enclosures. I.B.'s descrip-

tion cannot be reconciled with those of Polo or Odoric or the Chinese records. 'In
the whole of this description ... it is pretty clear that Ibn Batuta is drawing either
on his imagination, or (more probably) on his recollections of the Court of Delhi,
and hence we have the strongest ground for suspecting that he never entered the
palace of Peking, if indeed he ever saw that city at all' (Yule, Cathay, IV, p. 140,
n. 1). For mustakhraj, see III, p. 698, n. 152. The other terms used are again not
Chinese but Persian, the correct forms being pardeh-dari, ntzeh dan, tigMarfznd
jdnddri. Onsepdhi'm the sense of'archer', see above, p. 905 and n. 55.
65 No emperor of the Yuan dynasty, and no Mongol Khan, was called FTruz, a
Persian name.

907
 CHINA

him in the district of Qaraqurum and Bish Baligh in Khita. 66

From the capital to these places is three months' journey
through populated country. The §adr al-Jahan Burhan al-Dln
of Sagharj told me that when the Qan had assembled his
soldiers and mobilized his forces, a hundred squadrons of
300cavalry, each one | of ten thousand troopers, rallied to him.
Their commander is called amir of a (umdn.**7 In addition the
Sultan's private guards and the people of his household were
another fifty thousand. There were five hundred thousand
infantry. When he set out most of the amirs revolted and
agreed to depose him, because he had diverged from the
precepts of the yasaqf* that is to say, the precepts of their
ancestor Tankiz Khan, who laid waste the lands of Islam.
They went over to the rebel son of his uncle and wrote to the
Qan urging him to abdicate when the city of Khansa would be
his fief. He refused, fought against them, was defeated, and
was killed. 69
The news of these events arrived some days after we had
reached the capital. The city was decorated, drums were
beaten, trumpets and bugles were played, and amusements
and entertainments were organized for the space of a month.
Then the bodies of the dead Qan and about a hundred of his
uncle's sons, his relatives and his favourites were brought [to
301 the capital]. They dug for the Qan a big nd'us, which j is an
underground chamber, 70 spread with the finest carpets. The
Qan and his weapons were placed in it with the gold and silver
vessels from his palace. Four slave-girls and six of his favourite
mamluks with jars of drink were placed with them. The
gateway to the house was built up and earth was piled over it
all till it made a big hill. Then they brought four horses and
made them run at the grave till they collapsed. They erected
a wooden structure over the grave and fixed the horses to it

66 See III, p. 566, n. 162.

67 See II, p. 493, n. 293.
68 See III, p. 560, n. 77.
69 No Yuan emperor was killed in battle, though two were assassinated. The
supposed rebellion of Flruz may be a confused reflection of one of many
conflicts between Mongol princes and leaders in the concluding years of the
dynasty.
70
Greek aaos, 'temple', also used in Arabic for a subterranean tomb.

908
 FUNERAL OF THE QAN

after driving a wooden stake through each horse from the anus
to the mouth. The aforesaid relatives of the Qan were placed
in nffuses with their weapons and their household vessels.
Over the graves of the great men among them, of whom there
were ten, they impaled three horses for each grave. Over the
rest they impaled one horse for each. 71
This day was a day | of solemn holiday. No one stayed 302
away, neither man nor woman, Muslim nor infidel. They all
wore mourning, which means white capes for the infidels and
white robes for the Muslims. The khdtuns of the Qan and his
favourites stayed in tents at his grave for forty days, and some
of them for longer, up to a year. A bazaar was set up at his
grave where food and other necessaries were sold. I do not
recall that any other nation except this follows these practices
in our time. The Indian infidels and the people of China burn
their dead; other nations bury their dead but do not put in
anyone else with the corpse. However, I was told on good
authority in the country of the Blacks that the infidels there,
when their king dies, make a no*us for him and put in with him
some of his favourites and attendants, and thirty | of the sons 303
and daughters of important people, first breaking their hands
and feet, and place with them jars of drink. A prominent man
of the Massufa who lived among the Blacks in the country of
Kubar [Gobir], and was greatly favoured by their Sultan, told
me that he had a son and that when their Sultan died they
wanted to put his son into the tomb along with those of their
own sons whom they were putting in it. He said: 'I said to
them, "How can you do this when he is not of your religion or
of your race?" and I redeemed him for a considerable sum of
money.'
When the Qan was killed as we have related, his uncle's son
Firuz took possession of the kingdom and chose as his capital
the city of Qaraqurum because it is near the country of the
sons of his paternal uncle, the kings of Turkistan and 304

71 This is a plausible account of a pagan Mongol funeral. That of Hulegii,

Chingiz Khan's grandson and the first Ilkhan of Persia, (d. 1265) is 'the last
occasion on which human victims are recorded as having been buried with a
Chingizid prince' (Boyle, J. A. (ed.) The Cambridge History of Iran, V, p. 354).
Toghon Temur, expelled from China in 1368, survived I.B., dying in Mongolia
in 1370.

909
 CHINA

Trarasoxanla. Then the amirs who had not been present when
the Qin was killed rebelled against him; they cut communica-
tions and there was great disorder.72

72 During the fourteenth century Central Asia between China and Persia was
sometimes united under Khans descended from Chaghatai, ttte second son of
Chingiz Khan; sometimes it was divided among two or more princes, usually of
that family. By Twrkistaii 1,1, means what was often called Mogholistan, the
basin of the Hi and upper Chu rivers. From 1347 to 1363 this was ruled by
Tughluq Tetttuf who claimed descent from Chaghatai and eventually conquered
Transoxania. None of these princes was a nephew of Toghon Temor, the Mongol
emperor of China, of could have been a cousin of FftOz.

910
 CHAPTER XXIII

From China to Morocco

y| ccount of my Return to China and then to India. When the
Zl rebellion broke out and disorders flared up Shaikh
-L -L Burhan al-Dln and others advised me to return to China
before disorder became prevalent. They presented them-
selves with me to the deputy of Sultan Flruz, who sent three
of his suite with me and wrote giving me the right to hospital-
ity. We travelled down the river to Khansa, then to Qanjanfu,
and then to al-Zaitun. When I arrived there I found the junks
about to sail for India. Among them was a junk belonging to
al-Malik al-£ahir, the lord of al-Jawa. Its crew were Muslims.
His agent recognized me and was delighted that I had come.
We encountered favourable winds for ten days, but when we
were near the country of | TawalisT, the wind changed, the sky 305
became dark, and there was heavy rain. For ten days we did
not see the sun. Then we entered an unknown sea, the crew
of the junk were frightened, and they wanted to return to
China, but it was not possible. We spent forty-two days with-
out knowing in which sea we were.
Account of the Rukhkh. At first light on the forty-third day a
mountain became visible in the sea about twenty miles away.
The wind was carrying us directly towards it. The sailors were
amazed and said: 'We are not near land and there is no
knowledge of a mountain in the sea. If the wind drives us on
to it we shall perish.' Everyone resorted to self-abasement, to
devotion, and to renewed repentance, supplicating God in
prayer. We sought Him through His prophet, on whom be the
Blessing and Peace of God. The merchants swore | to give 306
plentiful alms, which I recorded in my own writing. The wind
became somewhat calmer and at sunrise we saw that mountain
had risen into the air and there was light between it and the
911
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

sea. We were amazed at this and I saw the sailors weeping and
saying good-bye to each other. I said: 'What is the matter?'
They said: 'What we took for a mountain is the rukhkh. If it
sees us we shall perish.' We were then less than ten miles
from it. Then God Most High gave us the blessing of a
favourable wind which took us directly away from it. We did
not see it or know its true shape. l
Two months after that day we reached al-Jawa and landed at
Sumutra. We found the Sultan al-Malik al-Zahir had arrived
307 after one of his expeditions and had brought | many prisoners.
He sent me two girls and two boys and lodged me as usual. I was
present at the wedding of his son with his brother's daughter.
Account of the wedding of the son of al-Malik al-Zdhir. I was
present on the day of the unveiling of the bride. I saw they
had erected in the middle of the audience hall a big tribune
and spread it with pieces of silk. The bride came on foot from
within the palace with her face visible. With her were about
forty ladies, wives of the Sultan, his amirs and his Wazirs, who
held up her train. They were all unveiled. Everyone present,
whether high or low, could look at them. This was not their
practice except at weddings. The bride climbed onto the
tribune. In front of her were musicians, men and women,
playing and singing. Then the groom came on an elephant |
308 caparisoned, with a throne on its back with a canopy over it as
over a palanquin. The said groom had a crown on his head. To
his right and left were about a hundred sons of maliks and
amirs, dressed in white, riding caparisoned horses, and with
caps on their heads encrusted with precious stones. They
were of the same age as the groom and were all beardless.
At his entry dinars and dirhams were strewn among the
people. The Sultan sat on a raised place from which he saw it
all. His son dismounted, kissed his foot, and climbed the
tribune to his bride. She rose and kissed his hand. He sat
beside her and the ladies fanned her. They brought areca nuts
and betel, which he took in his hand and put into her mouth.
Then the groom took a betel leaf in his mouth and then put it
309 in hers, and this was all done in the public eye. Then she did
what he had done. Then she was veiled and the tribune with

1 See Plate III, where the giant bird is called an 'anqd\

912
 FROM AL-JAWA TO QALHAT

both of them on it was carried into the palace. The people ate
and went away. Next day his father assembled the people and
made his son heir apparent. The people swore allegiance to
him and he gave them profuse gifts of robes and gold.
1 stayed in this island for two months and then embarked in
one of the junks. The Sultan gave me a great deal of aloes,
camphor, cloves and sandalwood, and dismissed me. I left him
and after forty days I reached Kaulam. I stayed there under the
protection of al-QazwInl, the qao1! of the Muslims. It was
Ramadan and I was present at the 'id prayer in the congrega-
tional mosque. It is their custom to come to the mosque at night
and to continue calling upon God till first light and then to call
on Him till the time of | the 'id prayer. Then they recite this 310
prayer, the preacher delivers his sermon, and they depart.
We left Kaulam for Qaliquf, where we stayed for some days.
I wanted to return to DihlT, but became afraid to do so. I took
ship and after twenty-eight nights I reached £afar. It was
Mufrarram in the year forty-eight, 2 and I stayed at the house of
the preacher elsa ibn Ta'pa'.
Account of the Sultan of %a'far. This time I found the Sultan to
be al-Malik al-Nasir son of al-Malik al-Mughith, who had
been king when I arrived there previously. 3 His deputy was
Saif al-Dln 'Omar, the amir jandar* Turkish by race. This
Sultan accommodated me and treated me with honour. Then
I took ship and reached Masqip, a small town where there is
plenty of the fish called | qulb almas* Then we travelled to the 311
port of Quraiyat, then to the port of Shabba, then to the port
of Kalba, which is pronounced like the feminine otkalb (dog),
and then to Qalhat, of which we have spoken before. 6 All

2 1 Mubarram 748 = 13 April 1347.

3 See vol. II, p. 390 and n. 86. Professor G. Rex Smith informs me that Gibb's
note confuses al-Malik al-Fa'iz Ahmad, brother of al-Malik al-Muzaffar Yusuf, the
second Rasulid Sultan, with al-Malik al-Fa'iz, the father of al-Mughith and
grandson of al-Muzaffar. See G. Rex Smith and Venetia Porter, 'The Rasulids in
Dhofar in the VIIth-VIIIth/XIHth-XIVth Centuries', JRAS, 1988, I.
4 The guard commander.
5 Already described in his account of the Maldives. See above, p. 823.
6 The order in which these places are mentioned is puzzling. If he was sailing
along the coast from £afar he would have come successively to Qalhat, Quraiyat,
Masqat and Kalba, now written Ghalla. Shabba might be Al-Shabb, a village near
TiwI, between Qalhat and Quraiyat. It is presumably the place called Shaba in II,
p. 399.

913
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

these places are administered from Hurmuz, though they are

reckoned to be part of 'Oman. We then travelled to Hurmuz
and stayed there for three days. Then we went by land to
Kaurastan, 7 then to Lar, 8 and Khunju Pal, 9 all of which we
have mentioned before. Then we went to Karzl, 10 where we
spent three days, then to Jamakan, then to Maiman, 11 then to
Bassa, 12 and then to the city of Shlraz. We found its Sultan
312 Abu Isfraq still reigning, but he | was away. 13 I met there our
pious and learned shaikh Majd al-Din the Grand Qao!l who
had gone blind. 14 May God profit him and us through him!
Then I went to Mayin, !5 then Yazdukhas, 16 then KalTl, 17 then
Kushkizar, 18 then Isfahan, 19 then Tustar, 20 then Iluwaiza, 21
and then al-Basra. All these places have been mentioned
before. 22 In al-Basra I visited the noble sepulchres which are
there of al-Zubair b. al-eAwwam, of Talha b. 'Ubaidallah, of
tlallma al-Saed!ya, of Abu Bakra, of Anas b. Malik, of al-
Hasan of Basra, of Thabit al-Bunanl, of Muhammad b. Sirin,
of Malik b. Dinar, of Muhammad b. Wasie, of Hablb the
Persian, and of Sahl b. "Abdallah of Tustar. 23 May God be
pleased with them all! Then we went from al-Basra to the
shrine of 'All b. Abl Talib. 24 May God be pleased with him,
7 Previously mentioned as Kaurastan (II, p. 405) and there identified as
Kuristan in n. 132.
8 See II, p. 405, n. 133.
9 See II, p. 406, n. 136.
10 Or Karzin, on the right bank of the Sakkan or Mand river.
11 See II, p. 304, n. 114. Maiman is Mimand, east of Firuzabad.
12 Fasa.
13 See II, pp. 306-11 and n. 118.
14 See II, pp. 300-306 and n. 99, pp. 308, 314, 316; III, p. 677.
15 See II, p. 299, where it is written MayTn, and n. 94.
16 Yazdikhwast. See II, p. 298 and n. 91.
17 See II, p. 298 and nn. 89, 90.
18 Kushk i-zar, 'the Gold Castle', has been mentioned (III, p. 715), but is in
India. The place meant here is Kushk-i-zard, 'the Yellow Castle'. This name
appears on maps, but is listed as Kushk-e-Zar in the Gazetteer of Iran published by
the Defense Mapping Agency, Washington DC, 1984.
19 See II, pp. 294-8.
20 See II, pp. 284-7.
21 Properly al-tfuwaiza'. See II, pp. 321-2.
22 See II, pp. 275-80.
23 For all of these except Thabit of Bunana, see II, pp. 278-9 and nn. 29-34.
Thabit b. Aslam was a traditionalist of the first half of the eighth century; Bunana
was a quarter of al-Basra.
See II, pp. 277-8, fora description of his previous visit to this mosque.

914
and visited it. Then we went to al-Kufa and visited | its 313
blessed mosque, then to Hilla, where is the Sanctuary of the
Master of the Age. 25
It happened about that time that an amir was governor of
the town and prohibited its people from going to the mosque
of the Master of the Age, as was their custom, and waiting for
him there. He forbade them the use of the mounts which they
used to take from the amir every night. An illness struck this
governor and he soon died. This served to increase the recal-
citrance of the heretics. They said: 'He was afflicted like that
only because he refused the use of the mounts.' Afterwards it
was not refused.
Then I travelled to $arsar, 26 then to the city of Baghdad
where I arrived in Shawwal of the year forty-eight. 27 I met
there with someone from the Maghrib, who informed me of
the disaster of Tarlfa and the capture of Al-Khao'ra [Algeciras]
by the Christians. 28 May God repair this breach in Islam. |
Account of the Sultan of Baghdad. The Sultan of Baghdad and 314
Iraq when I arrived there on the said date was Shaikh Hasan,
the son of the paternal aunt of Sultan Abu Said. 29 May God
have mercy upon him! When Abu Saeld died Shaikh Hasan
took control of Iraq and married his wife Dilshad, the daugh-
ter of Dimashq Khwaja, son of the Amir Chuban, as Sultan
Abu Saeld had done when he married the wife of Shaikh
Hasan. Sultan tlasan was away from Baghdad at this time; he
had gone to fight the Sultan Atabak Afrasiyab, lord of the
country of the Lurs. 30
Then I left Baghdad and came to the city of al-Anbar, then
to Hit, then to al-Hadltha, and then to 'Ana. These places are
among the most beautiful and most fertile in the world. The
road between them is thickly populated and it is as though
someone travelling through it were in a bazaar. | We have said 315

25 For the mosque at al-Kufa, see II, pp. 322-4; for the mosque at al-tfilla, see
II, pp. 324-5.
26 The name of two villages, Upper and Lower §arsar on the *Isa canal.
27 January 1348.
28 The defeat of Abu'1 Hasan the Marinid Sultan of Morocco by Alfonso XI of
Castile at the Rio Salado near Tarifa in 1340, and the Christian capture of
Algeciras in 1342.
29 See II, pp. 338-41 and n. 231.
30 See II, p. 288 and n. 59.

915
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

before that we have not seen anything like the country by the
Chinese river except this country. 31 Then I reached the city of
al-Rahba which is the one given the name of Malik b. Tauq. 32
The city of al-Rafrba is the most beautiful place in Iraq and is
also the beginning of Syria. Then we travelled to al-Sakhna, a
fine town, most of whose inhabitants are Christian infidels. It
is called Sakhna because of the heat of the water there. 33 It has
rooms for men and for women in which they bathe. They draw
water and at night put it on the flat roofs to cool. Then we
went to Tadmur, the city of the Prophet of God Sulaiman,
Peace be upon him, which the jinns built for him, as Nabigha
said:
They built Tadmur with flagstones and columns. 34
Then they went to the city of Damascus of Syria, from which
I had been absent fully twenty years. I had left there a
316pregnant wife. 35 While I was in | India I learnt that she had
given birth to a male child. I had then sent forty Indian gold
dinars for his mother to his grandfather, who was from Miknasa
[Meknes] in the Maghrib. When I came to Damascus this
time I had no other concern than to ask after my son. I went
into the mosque and luckily found Nur al-Dln al-SakhawT, the
Imam of the MalikTs and their leader. 36 I greeted him but he
did not recognize me. I let him know who I was and asked him
about my son. He said: 'He died twelve years ago', and told
me that a jurist from Tangier lived in the £ahiriya madrasa. 37
I went there to ask him about my father and my family. I
found him to be a venerable shaikh. I greeted him and told
him about my family. He told me my father had died fifteen
years ago, and that my mother was still living.

31 See above, p. 905.

32 So-called after Malik b, Tauq b. 'Attab al-Taghlibi, who restored it early in
the eighth century, to distinguish it from several other towns with the same name.
33 Arabic sakhna, sukhna 'feverish heat'. The name of the town is now usually
written Sukhna.
34 Yaqut relates that the jinns built Palmyra for Solomon and quotes this
hemistich by the famous pre-Islamic poet Nabigha al-Dhubyanl.
35 He had visited Damascus in August 1326. See I, pp. 118-57. He does not
refer to his marriage in describing his stay.
36 See I, pp. 150-51. Ibn Bapfupa had stayed with him.
37 See I, p. 137 and n. 257.

916
 DAMASCUS

I stayed in Damascus of Syria for the rest of the year. 38 Prices 31?
were very high; bread rose to be seven okes for a silver dirham.
Their oke is equal to four Maghrib! okes. The Grand Qatfi of the
Malikis was then Jamal al-Dln al-Maslatl. 39 He was a companion
of Shaikh 'Ala' al-Dln of Konya40 and had come to Damascus
with him. He became known there and was made a qao!!. The
Grand Qao!l of the ShafVis was Taqi al-Dln b. al-Subki. The
amir of Damascus was the malik of the amirs Arghun Shah. 41
Anecdote. At that time one of the important people of Damas-
cus died and bequeathed his property to the poor. The trustee
of his bequest used to buy bread and distribute it daily to the
poor after the afternoon prayer. One night they assembled in
great numbers and seized the bread that was to be distributed
to them and laid hands on the bakers' bread. When news of
this reached the amir Arghun Shah he sent out his myrmidons.
Whenever they | met with one of the poor they said to him: 3is
'Gome and get bread.' A considerable number of them gather-
ed and they imprisoned them for the night. Next day he rode
out, made them come to the castle, and ordered their hands
and feet to be cut off, though most of them were innocent. He
drove out the crowd of harafish from Damascus: they dis-
persed to Hims, Hama and Aleppo. I was told he lived only a
short time after this, and that he was killed. I left Damascus
for Hims, tiama, Ma'arra, Sarmln and then Aleppo. 42 The
amir of Aleppo at this time was the Hajj Rughpay. 43

38 Recounting his previous visit to Damascus in 1326 I.B. gives a long list of
scholars who gave him licence to teach (I, pp. 154-7). Gibb noted that it was
difficult to see how he could have obtained them all in a stay of less than a month (I,
p. 157, n. 338). It seems likely that, though he states explicitly that they were given
him in that year, some of them were acquired during this much longer residence.
39 Muhammad b. *Abd al-Rahlm b. 'All b. 'Abd al-Malik al-SalamT al-Maslatl,
MalikT judge in Damascus for over twenty years, d. 1370. (Durar, IV, p. 11, no. 25.)
40 See I, p. 134 and n. 245.
41 Saif al-Dln Arghun al-Kamil! al-Saghlr (the Little), in succession governor
(na'ib) of Aleppo, Damascus and again Aleppo, d. 1357. In their index the French
editors confuse him with Arghun Shah the Dawadar (I, p. 54 and n. 166), who
died in 1330. For his biography see Manhal, II, pp. 319-25, no. 375.
42 For I.B.'s previous visit to these towns see I, pp. 90-103.
43 Ibn TaghrlbirdI calls him al-Hajj Saif al-Dln Urqatay b. 'Abdallah al-Qafjaq.
The correct form of his name is probably Urughtay. He was successively governor
of Safad, Tripoli and Aleppo, then viceroy (na'ib saltana) of Egypt, then again
governor of Aleppo. He died in 1357 on his way to Damascus to which he had
been transferred. For his biography, see Manhal, II, p. 328, no. 378.

917
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

Anecdote. It happened at this time that a faqir known as the

319 shaikh of shaikhs was | living on a mountain outside the city of
'Aintab. People used to seek him out and solicit his blessing.
He had a pupil always with him, but he was solitary and
celibate, having no wife. In one of his discourses he said: 'The
Prophet, May God bless him and give him peace, did not do
without women, but I do without them.' There was a witness
of this and it was proved before the qap!l. The case was
referred to those amirs and he and his pupil, who had agreed
with what he had said, were arraigned. The four qatfls, who
were Shihab al-Dln the MalikI, Nasir al-Din the Destitute,
the Hanaff, Taqi al-Dln son of the goldsmith, the $hafiel, and
elzz al-Dln of Damascus, the Hanball, authorized the death
penalty for them both, and they were executed.
In the first days of the month of Rabfl in the year forty-nine
news reached us in Aleppo that plague had broken out in
32oGhazza and that the number of dead there exceeded | a
thousand a day. 44 I went to Hims and found that the plague
had already struck there; about three hundred persons died on
the day of my arrival. I went to Damascus and arrived on a
Thursday; the people had been fasting for three days. On
Friday they went to the Mosque of the Footprints, as we have
related in the first book. 45 God alleviated their plague. The
number of deaths among them had risen to two thousand four
hundred a day. Then I went to cAjlun, and then to Bait al-
Muqaddas [Jerusalem], where I found the plague had ceased.
I met the preacher clzz al-Din, son of Jama'a, son of the
paternal uncle of elzz al-Dln the Grand Qao!l of Cairo. 46 He is
a pious and generous man. His salary as preacher is a thousand
dirhams a month.
Anecdote. The preacher *Izz al-Dln gave a banquet one day and
321 invited me among | his guests. I asked him the reason for it.
He told me that during the plague he had sworn he would give
a banquet if the plague were to cease and a day were to pass
during which he did not pray over a corpse. Then he said:
'Yesterday I did not pray over a corpse so I arranged the
banquet as I had promised.'
44 May/June 1348. The Black Death.
45 See I, pp. 142-4.
46 See I, p. 55 and n. 173.

918
 FROM JERUSALEM TO ALEXANDRIA

I found that some of the shaikhs I had met in al-Quds

[Jerusalem] had departed to be with God Most High. May He
have mercy on them! Only a few of them were left like the
learned traditionist the imam §alah al-Dln Khalll, the son of
Kaikald! al-eAla'I, and like the pious Sharaf al-Dln al-
Khushshl, the shaikh of the hospice of the mosque of al-Aqsa.
I met Shaikh Sulaiman of Shlraz. He gave me hospitality. I
met no one else in Syria and Egypt who had visited the Foot
of Adam. Peace be upon him!
I left Jerusalem accompanied by the preacher and | tradi-322
tionist Sharaf al-Dln Sulaiman of Milyana and the shaikh of
the Maghribls there, the admirable Sufi Talha al-eAbd al
Wadl. We reached the city of al-Khalll [Hebron], Peace be
upon it, and we visited his tomb and those of the prophets
there, Peace be upon them. Then we went to Ghazza and
found most of it deserted because of the numbers that had
died during the plague. The qao!l told me that only a quarter
of the eighty notaries there were left and that the number of
deaths had risen to eleven hundred a day. We then went by
land to Dimyat. where I met Qufb al-Dln of Naqshuwan who
fasts incessantly. 47 He accompanied me to Faras Kur and
Samannud and then to Abu §Ir where we stayed in the hospice
of one of the Egyptians. 48
Anecdote. While we were in that hospice | a faqir entered and 323
greeted us. We offered him food, but he refused it and said: 'I
came only to visit you.' He spent the whole night in prostra-
tion and bowing in prayer. We prayed the dawn prayer and
gave ourselves over to the praise of God, while the faqir stayed
in a corner of the hospice. The shaikh came with food and
called him, but he did not answer. He went over to him and
found him dead. We prayed over him and buried him. May
God have mercy upon him!
Then I travelled to al-Mahalla al-Kabira, then to Naforariya,
then to Abyar, then to Damanhur,49 and then to Alexandria. 50

47 For his previous visits to Hebron, see I, pp. 73-7, to Gaza, I, p. 73, and to
Damietta, I, pp. 36-9.
48 For Faraskur (usually Fariskur) and Samannud, see I, p. 40. Abu Sir has not
been mentioned previously; it is a small town near Tanta.
49 See I, p. 34 and n. 91; I, p. 32 and n. 85; I, pp. 32-3 and n. 87, and I, p. 30.
50 For I.B.'s description of Alexandria, see I, pp. 18-28.

919
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

I found the plague had abated after the number of deaths had
risen to a thousand and eighty a day. Then I went to Cairo and
was told that during the plague the number of deaths there
had risen to twenty-one thousand a day. I found that all the
shaikhs I had known were dead. May God Most High have
mercy upon them! |
324 Account of the Sultan of Cairo. The king of Egypt at that time
was al-Malik al-Nasir Hasan, son of al-Malik al-Nasir Muham-
mad, son of al-Malik al-Mansur Qalawun. 51 He was afterwards
deposed and his brother al-Malik al-§alib became ruler. When
I arrived in Cairo I found that the Grand Qao!i elzz al-Dln, son
of the Grand Qa^i Badr al-Dln, son of Jama'a, 52 had set out for
Mecca in a huge caravan called RajabI, because it leaves in the
month of Rajab. I was told that the plague was among them
until they reached the pass of Aila53 where it ceased. I then
went from Cairo to the Sa'Id, which has already been spoken
of, to 'Aidhab, 54 whence I sailed to Judda, 55 and then went to
Mecca, May God Most High ennoble and honour her! I
arrived on the twenty-second of Sha'ban of the year forty-
nine. 56 I put myself under the protection of the MalikI Imam,
325 the pious, the devout, | the excellent Abu "Abdallah Muham-
mad, son of'Abd al-Rahman called Khalil. 57 I fasted through
the month of Ramadan in Mecca. Every day I visited the holy
places according to the Shaft*! madhhab. Among the shaikhs of
Mecca I knew I met Shihab al-Dln al-I^anafT, 58 Shihab al-Dln
al-Tabarl, 59 Abu Muhammad al-YafVl, 60 Najm al-Dln al-
Usfunl,61 and al-Harazi. 62
51 Al-Malik al-Nasir Hasan, 1347-51, son of al-Malik al-Nasir Mubammad
1293-4, 1298-1308 and 1309-40, son of al-Malik al-Mansur Qala'un, 1279-90. He
was followed by his brother al-Malik al-Salib Salib, 1351-4.
52 See I, p. 55 and n. 173. 53 See I, p. 159 and n. 14.
54 For his previous journey through the Said to 'Aidhab, see I, pp. 59-69.
55 For his previous visit to Judda, see II, pp. 360-61.
56 16 November 1348. S7 See I, p. 203 and n. 69.
58 See I, p. 219 and n. 127. S9 See I, p. 216 and n. 119.
60 'Abdallah As'ad b. 'All b. Sulaiman b. Fallah al-Yafil al-Yamanl al-Shaftt,
'Afif al-Din. See also I, p. 221, where he is not identified. He spent much of his
life in Mecca where he died in 1367. He had studied with Shihab al-Dln al-
Tabarl, Durar, II, pp. 247-9; Subki, Jabaqdt al-ShdJfiya, VI, p. 103.
61 See I, p. 221 and II, p. 356.
62 Either Abmad b. Qasim b. 'Abd al-Rahman b. Abl Bakr al-Qurashl al-'Amri,
from Haraz in al-Yaman, 1276/7-1354, Durar, I, pp. 235-6, or his son Mubam-
mad, 1306/7-1363-4, Durar, III, p. 348.

920
 IBN BATTUTA DECIDES TO GO HOME

I made the pilgrimage in that year and then left with the
Syrian caravan for Taiba, the city of the Prophet of God. May
God bless and give him peace. I visited his noble and per-
fumed tomb, may God increase it in perfume and honour. I
prayed in the noble mosque, may God purify it and enhance
its magnificence. I visited the Companions of the Prophet.
God bless him and give him peace, who are in Al-Baqf,63 God
be pleased with them. Among the shaikhs I met Abu Muham-
mad, son of Farfrun. 64
We left Madlna the noble for al'Ula and Tabuk, | then Bait 326
al-Muqaddas [Jerusalem], then the city of al-Khalil, God bless
him and give him peace, then to Ghazza, 65 then the desert
stations, all of which have been described before, and then
Cairo. There we learnt that Our Master the Commander of
the Faithful, the Protector of True Religion, who places his
trust in the lord of the worlds, Abu *Inan, may God Most High
assist him, had under God brought together the scattered
pieces of the Marinid dominion and by his blessing had healed
the countries of the Maghrib after their being near to death,
had poured forth benefits on high and low, and had enwrap-
ped all the people in a profusion of favours. 66 They longed to
stand at his gate in the hope of kissing his stirrup. Thereupon
I sought to make my way to his exalted capital. The memory
of my homeland moved me, affection for my people and
friends, and love for my country which for me is better than all
others. |
A land where charms were hung upon me 327
Whose earth my skin first touched
I sailed in a small qurqura belonging to a Tunisian. This was
in $afar of the year fifty. 67 1 landed in Jarba but the boat went
63 The cemetery of al-Madlna. See I, pp. 179-80.
64 See I, p. 174 and n. 72.
65
For his previous visits to, and descriptions of, these places, see I, p. 73
(Gaza), pp. 73-7 (Hebron), pp. 77-80 Gerusalem), p. 161 (Tabuk), and pp. 162-
3 CUla).
66 In 1347 the MarTnid Sultan of Morocco Abu'1 JJasan conquered the domin-
ions of the Hafsid ruler of Tunis, but in April 1348 he was defeated by Arab tribes
and was widely supposed to have been killed. His son Abu 'Inan Paris was
proclaimed Sultan at Tilimsan in June 1348, but his father returned and fought
unsuccessfully against him until his own death in 1351.
67 April-May 1349.

921
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

on to Tunis and the enemy captured it. Then I went in a small

boat to Qabis [Gabes], where I landed and was the guest of
two excellent brothers, Abu Marwan and Abu'l-*Abbas, sons
of Makkl, the amirs of Jarba and Qabis. 68 I spent with them
the birthday of the Prophet, God bless him and give him
peace. Then I took a boat to Safaqus [Sfax], then went by sea
to Bulyana. 69 and then by land with the Arabs, after a trouble-
some journey reaching the city of Tunis, which the Arabs
were besieging. 70 |
328 Account of the Sultan of Tunis. Tunis was under the government
of Our Master, the Commander of the Muslims, the Protector
of True Religion, the warrior who fights on behalf of the Lord
of the Worlds, paladin of paladins, incomparable among gener-
ous kings, lion of lions, most magnanimous of the magnani-
mous, the devout, who turns to God, the humble, the just
Abu'l-Hasan, son of Our Master the Commander of the Mus-
lims, the warrior who fights on behalf of the Lord of the Worlds,
the Protector of the faith of Islam, whose virtue has become a
proverb, whose acts of generosity and graciousness are dissemi-
nated throughout the regions of the world, author of virtuous,
glorious, illustrious and beneficent deeds, the just and excel-
lent king Abu Sa'Id, 71 son of Our Master the Commander of the
Muslims, the Protector of True Religion, the warrior on behalf
of the Lord of the Worlds, the conqueror and destroyer of
infidels, who began and then repeated the exploits of the holy
war, the protector of true belief, the zealous in what pertains to
3291 the Merciful, the devout, the ascetic who bows and prostrates
himself in prayer, the humble, the pious Abu Yusuf son of *Abd
al-tJaqq, 72 God be pleased with them all and cause the king-
dom to remain with their descendants till the day of Judgment.
68
' Abu Marwan Ahmad b. Makkl was entrusted with the government of the
island of Jerba after the expulsion of the Sicilian garrison in 1335; he later extended
his authority over Sfax. His brother Abu'1 'Abbas 'Abdul Malik was the virtually
independent ruler of Qabis. The brothers affected the status of jurists (Brunschvig,
I, pp. 158-9, 174).
69 Belliana or Balliyana near Sfax, Brunschvig, I, pp. 310-11. This supersedes
Gibb's tentative identification with Nabeul, Selections, p. 375, n. 14.
70 After defeating Abu'1 Hasan at Qairawan the Arab tribes besieged Tunis
where the garrison remained loyal to him. He reached the city in July and stayed
there till December 1349, when he sailed for Bijaya.
71 Abu Said 'Othman II, 1310-31.
72 Abu Yusuf Ya'qub, 1258-86.

922
 TUNIS

When I reached Tunis I sought out al-Hajj Abu'l-Hasan

because of the ties of relationship and citizenship between
us. He accommodated me in his house and went with me to
the audience hall. I went into the noble hall and kissed the
hand of Our Master Abu'l-Hasan, God be pleased with him.
He ordered me to sit down, which I did. He asked me about
the noble Hijaz and the Sultan of Egypt and I answered him.
He asked me about Ibn Tlfarajln. 73 I told him what the
Maghribls had done about him to assist | Our Master Abu'1-330
Hasan, God be pleased with him. Among the jurists present at
his assembly were the imam Abu 'Abdallah al-Saf,t,T74 and the
imam Abu 'Abdallah Muhammad b. al-§abbagh75 and among
the Tunisians their qao1! Abu 'All eOmar b. eAbd al-RafT76 and
AbQ 'Abdallah b. Harun. 77
I left the noble assembly but after the afternoon prayer Our
Master Abu'l-Hasan summoned me. He was in a tower over-
looking the field of battle. With him were the illustrious shaikhs
Abu 'Omar 'Othman b. *Abd al-Wahid al-Tanalaftl, 78 Abu
Hassun Ziyan, son of Amriyun al-eAlawT, Abu Zakanya' Yabya
son of Sulaiman al-eAskari, and al-Hajj Abu'l-tJasan al-NamlsI.
He asked me about the king of India and I answered his
questions. I went on going back and forth to the noble assembly
so long as I stayed in Tunis, which was for thirty-six days.

73 'Abdallah b. TlfarajTn or Tafragin, an Almohad shaikh who acquired great

influence at the Hafsid court in Tunis and arranged the marriage of the Marinid
Sultan Abu'1 Hasan to a Hafsid princess. In the course of succession disputes
which ensued after the death of the Hafsid Sultan Abu Bakr in 1346 Ibn Tafragin
and Abu'1 Hasan came to support rival claimants. When Abu'1 Hasan occupied
Tunis in 1348 Ibn Tafragin fled to Egypt. He returned in 1350 and was the virtual
ruler of Tunis till his death in 1364.
74 Muhammad b. Salman al-SapfJ, a Maliki jurist and favourite of Sultan Abu'1
Hasan, whom he accompanied at the battle of Qairawan and during his subse-
quent stay in Tunis. He was drowned off the coast near Bijaya (Bougie) when the
Sultan's fleet was wrecked there in the winter of 1349-50 (Nail al-ibtihdj).
75 Muhammad ibn al-Sabbagh al-Khazraji of Miknasa (Meknes), another
Maliki jurist who accompanied Sultan Abu'1 Hasan to Tunis and was drowned
along with al-Satf! (Nail al-ibtihdj).
76 QadT for marriages and then communal qadl at Tunis, d. 1364-5, Brunsch-
vig, II, p. 115.
77 Muhammad b. Harun al-Kinanl of Tunis, a celebrated mufti and commenta-
tor on Maliki law, who died of the plague in 1349-50 (Nail al-ibtihaj).
78 The last name should perhaps be Tan al-Ruft! or Tan al-Zuftl, associating
him with either the district known as Tanerrouft in Algeria, or with Wad! Tanez-
zuft in Libya.

923
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

331 In Tunis I met the shaikh, the imam, the seal and chief of
the 'ulamd' Abu 'Abdallah of Abila. 79 He was on a sickbed and
he enquired about many matters concerned with my travels. I
travelled from Tunis by sea with the Catalans. We reached the
island of Sardaniya [Sardinia], a Christian island. There is a
wonderful harbour with huge pieces of wood around it and an
entrance like a gate, which is opened only with their
permission. 80 In the island are fortresses, one of which we
entered. There were many bazaars inside it. I vowed to God
Most High that if He delivered us from this island I would fast
for two months, because we had learnt that its people had
resolved to follow us and take us prisoners when we left. We
departed from the island and after ten days reached the city of
Tanas, then Mazuna, then Mustaghanim, 81 and then Tilim-
332 san. I sought out al-eUbbad | and visited the shaikh Abu
Madyan, God be pleased with him and grant favours through
him. 82 Then I left by the Nadruma road, 83 followed the
Akhandaqan road and spent the night at the hospice of Shaikh
Ibrahim. 84 Then we continued our journey and when we were
near Azaghnaghan85 we were attacked by fifty men on foot and
two horsemen. I was with Al-Hajj Ibn Qarfat of Tangier and
his brother Muhammad who afterwards died a martyr at sea.

79 The French editors read al-UbullT, i.e. from Ubulla, which is in Iraq. See II,
p. 281, for Ibn Bappufa's description of it as having become a mere village. The
correct reading is probably al-Abill. Mubammad b. Ibrahim b. Abmad aFAbdari of
Tilimsan called al-Abill was a Maliki jurist whose father had migrated from Spain
to Tilimsan. He was one of the religious advisers of Abu'1 Hasan and Abu 'Inan
and died at Fez in 1356. He is the subject of a long notice in Nail al-ibtihaj, pp.
245-8.
80 Evidently Cagliari, then an Aragonese possession.
81 Tenes, Mazouna and Mostaganem.
82 A village near Tilimsan, sometimes marked Eubbad on maps, but generally
known as Sidi Bou Mediene. Abu Madyan Shu'aib b. al-Husain or al-Hasan was
born near Seville and died at Tilimsan in 1197-8. He had immense influence on
popular Islamic mysticism in NW Africa. His shrine was built by Abu'1 Hasan in
1339 in a cemetery already containing the tombs of many celebrated for their
piety. See Brunschvig, II, pp. 317-19. It is illustrated in G. Marcais VArchitecture
musulmane (fOccident, 1954, p. 281.
83 Nedroma.
84 Near Ghazaouet (formerly Nemours). Akhandaqan and Azaghnaghan in the
next sentence may represent one name.
85 'A Berber tribe settled near the coast between Melilla and the Muluya river',
Gibb, Selections^ p. 375, n. 17. The name is not vowelled in the text and may be
Segangan, some 15 km south of Melilla.

924
 MOROCCO THE BEST COUNTRY

We decided to fight them and raised a flag. They then made

peace with us and we with them, praise be to God. I reached
the city of Taza, where I learnt that my mother had died of the
plague, God Most High have mercy upon her. I left Taza and
on the last Friday of Sha'ban the blessed in the year seven
hundred and fifty86 I reached the capital city of Fez.
I stood before our exalted master, the most generous imam,
the Commander of the Faithful, | who puts his trust in the 333
Lord of the Worlds, Abu elnan, 87 God establish his grandeur
and crush his enemies. His majesty caused me to forget the
majesty of the Sultan of Iraq, his beauty to forget that of the
king of India, his gracious manners those of the king of al-
Yaman, his courage that of the king of the Turks, his clemen-
cy that of the king of the Greeks, his devotion that of the king
of Turkistan, his theological learning that of the king of al-
Jawa. Before him was his excellent Wazir, author of renowned
noble deeds and exploits, Abu Zayyan b. Wadrar. 88 He asked
me about Egypt, where he had been, and I answered his
questions. Our master, God Most High support him, over-
whelmed me with favours for which I am unable to thank him
[adequately]. God is able to recompense him.
I laid down my travelling staff in his noble country after
verifying with superabundant impartiality that it is the best of
countries. Its fruits are plentiful, | water and provisions are 334
easy to get, and few regions of the world have all these
together. The poet spoke well who said:
The West is the best of lands as I can prove
The full moon is near to it and the sun runs thither
The dirhams of the West are small but they have many advan-
tages. If you consider prices in Egypt and Syria the truth of
what I say is apparent, and the excellence of the Maghrib
obvious. I say that mutton is sold in Egypt at the rate of
eighteen okes for a silver dirham, which is six Maghrib!
dirhams; in the Maghrib when the price is very high eighteen

86 6 November 1349.
87 After being proclaimed Sultan at Tilimsan Abu elnan had gained possession
of Fez.
88 Paris b. Zaiyan b. Wadrar, appointed a junior vizier after the proclamation of
Abu 'Inan at Tilimsan, Ibn Khaldun, Herberts, IV, 273, Ibn al-Abmar, p. 81, n. 2.

925
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

okes are sold for two dirhams, that is a third of the Egyptian
335 dirham. As for butter it is not to be had in Egypt | most of the
time. What is eaten with bread by the Egyptians are things
despised in the Maghrib. Mostly they are lentils and chick-
peas, which they cook in heavy cauldrons and on which they
put sesame oil; basilla,** which is a kind of peas which they
cook and to which they add olive oil; gherkins which they
cook and mix with curdled milk; purslane, which they cook in
the same way; the buds on the young shoots of the almond
tree, which they cook and on which they put curdled milk;
colocasia, which they cook. All these are easy to get in the
Maghrib but God has made them superfluous by the abund-
ance of meat, butter, both clarified and fresh, honey, and
other things. Green vegetables are very rare in Egypt; fruit is
mostly imported from Syria; grapes, when they are cheap, are
336 sold among them | at three of their pounds for a silver dirham,
their pound being twelve okes.
In Syria fruit is plentiful but it is cheaper in the Maghrib.
Grapes are sold there at a silver dirham for one of their
pounds, their pound being three Maghrib! pounds. When the
price is low two pounds are sold for a silver dirham. Plums are
sold at ten okes for a silver dirham. Pomegranates and quinces
are sold for eight fals apiece, which amounts to a Maghribl
dirham. Vegetables sold for a silver dirham are less in quantity
than are sold for a small dirham in our country. Meat is sold
there at two and a half silver dirhams for one of their pounds.
If you consider all that it will be obvious that the countries of
337 the Maghrib are the cheapest | in prices, the most abundant in
resources, and the foremost in amenities and advantages.
God has increased the lands of the Maghrib in honour after
honour and in excellence after excellence through the imamate
of our master the Commander of the Faithful, who has ex-
tended the shade of security over its countries, has caused the
sun of justice to rise over its expanse, has made the clouds to
deluge the countryside and the towns with beneficence, has
purified it of evildoers and has established in it the founda-
tions of secular and of religious life. I shall recount examples I
have witnessed and verified of his justice, his clemency, his

89 Italian piselli.

926
courage, his addiction to religious learning and the study of
the holy law, his constant almsgiving and his alleviation of
oppression.
Account of some of the virtues of Our Master, God strengthen him.
His justice is more renowned than can be recorded in a book.
An instance is that he has sessions to hear complaints from his
subjects; | he devotes Fridays to the poor, dividing the day 338
between men and women, giving women priority because of
their weakness. Their petitions are read from after the Friday
prayer until the afternoon prayer. Each one whose turn has
come is summoned by name. She stands in his precious pre-
sence and he speaks to her without an intermediary. If she has
been the victim of oppression, it is quickly rectified; if she
requests a favour, relief is at hand. When the afternoon prayer
has been prayed, the men's petitions are read and are dealt
with in the same way. The jurists and qao'Is are present at the
audience and decisions connected with the religious law are
referred to them. I have not seen any other king act so impec-
cably and display such justice. The king of India appointed
one | of his amirs to receive petitions from the people and to 339
summarize them for him, but the petitioners themselves were
not in his presence.
As for his clemency I have witnessed wonderful instances of
it, for he, God strengthen him, has pardoned many of those
who have fought against his troops and resisted his authority,
and also great criminals whose crimes no one would pardon
unless he trusts in his Lord and who knows with certain
knowledge** the meaning of the words of the Most High pardon
the offences of the peopled
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'One of the wonderful instances of the
clemency of our master, God strengthen him, that I have
witnessed since I came to his noble gate in the last days of the
year fifty-three until now, that is to say, in the first days of the
year fifty-seven, 92 I have not seen him order anyone to be
executed unless it was someone whose execution | was de-340
creed in the religious law as the penalty stipulated by God
Most High as retaliation or in war, and this is in spite of the
90 Qur'an, sura cii, 5.
91 Qur'an, sura iii, 134.
92 The year 757 began on 5 January 1356.

927
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

extent of his kingdom, the spaciousness of his provinces and

the diversity of peoples. Nothing like it has been heard of in
times past or in distant countries.
As for his courage, it is known what constancy and audacity
he showed on illustrious fields, as on the day he fought the
Banu eAbd al-Wadl and others. 93 I have heard the story of that
day told in the country of the Blacks. It was related to their
Sultan and he said: 'Like that, or not at all.'
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'The kings of ancient times were al-
ways vying with one another in killing lions and in routing
their enemies, but our master, God strengthen him, killed a
341 lion more easily than a sheep | is killed by a lion. A lion
attacked the troops in Wadi al-Najjarin in the cultivated part
of the district of Sala. The champion fighters, both horsemen
and foot soldiers, hovered round him and fled from him. Our
master, God strengthen him, came out against him and casually
and fearlessly thrust his spear between his eyes so that he fell
dead. On hands and mouth! 94
'As for putting enemies to flight, this happens to kings
because of the steadiness of their troops and the elan of their
cavalry. The part of kings is to stand firm and incite them to
fight. But our master, God strengthen him, advanced against
the enemy, alone in his noble person, knowing that the mass
of troops had fled and assured that no one who would fight had
stayed with him; thereupon fear overcame the hearts of the
342 enemy | who fled before him. It was wonderful to see nations
fleeing before one man. That is a grace which God bestows on
whomsoever he wishes, 195 Success is with those who fear God.*** This
is nothing but the fruit of the favours he obtains from God
through his trust in Him and his total reliance upon Him.'
As for his concern for religious knowledge, look how he,
God Most High strengthen him, convenes meetings of the

93 In June 1352 Abu 'Inan reconquered Tilimsan from the 'Abd al-Wadid
dynasty. I.E. probably refers to the battle of Angad when Marinid light horse
deserted and the Sultan led a charge against the enemy (Ibn Khaldun, Berberes,
IV, p. 293).
On hands and mouth. A saying used to express pleasure at someone's
misfortune the meaning being 'May God make him fall on his hands and mouth'.
(Freytag, Arabum proveriria, II, 1839, p. 475, no. 243).
95 Qur'an, sura v, 57, Ivii, 21, and Ixii, 4.
96 Qur'an, sura vii, 128, and xxviii, 83.

928
 learned every day after the dawn prayer in the mosque of his
noble palace, attended by the principal jurists and the most
distinguished scholars. The commentary on the Holy Qur'an
is read before him, and the Traditions of the Chosen One,
God give him blessing and peace, and the elaborations of the
madhhab of Malik, God be pleased with him, and the books of
the Sufis. In all these subjects his is the highest attainment; he
solves their difficulties with the light of his understanding and
illuminating apothegms are projected | from his memory. This 343
was the procedure of the rightly guided Imams and the Ortho-
dox Caliphs. I have not seen any of the kings of the world
whose concern for religious knowledge attains this degree. I
have seen before the king of India discussions held after the
dawn prayer, particularly on matters of rational knowledge. I
have seen before the king of al-Jawa discussions after the
Friday prayer particularly on the application of the teachings
of the Shafi'I madhhab. I admired the assiduity of the king of
Turkistan in attending the night and dawn prayers in the
congregation till I saw the assiduity of our master, God streng-
then him, in the quest for all religious knowledge in the
congregation in the mosque and in the observances of Rama-
dan. God bestows his mercy on whom he wishes.""
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'If there were a scholar with nothing344
to do but study day and night he would not reach the lowest
degree of the knowledge possessed by our master, God
strengthen him, though he gives his attention also to the
affairs of the community, and to the administration of remote
provinces, supervises the affairs of his dominions more closely
than any other king, and examines personally the complaints
of those who have been wronged. In spite of all this, if a
difficulty arises in any branch of knowledge in his noble
assembly, he clarifies its obscurity, discusses its subtleties,
elucidates its enigmas, and enables the scholars in the assem-
bly to comprehend abstruse points which had eluded them.
'He, God strengthen him, then rose to the exalted know-
ledge of the Sufis, understood the symbols they use, and
assumed their manners. The consequence has become evi-
dent in his humility for all his exalted rank, in his solicitude

97 Qur'an, sura ii, 105, and iii, 74.

929
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

for his subjects, and his affability in everything. He has

345 devoted himself greatly | to belles-lettres, which he has prac-
tised and the standing of which he has heightened. From
him came the noble epistle and the poem which he sent to the
noble, holy, pure Garden, the Garden of the chief of the
prophets, the intercessor for sinners, the Prophet of God, God
give him blessing and peace. He wrote them with his own
handwriting, which for beauty puts the Garden to shame.
That is something no other king of this age ever undertook or
even aspired to do. Anyone who considers the rescripts issued
by him, God Most High strengthen him, and who has fully
comprehended their contents, will realize the pre-eminent
eloquence with which God has endowed our master in creat-
ing him and which, both natural and acquired, has been
conjoined in him.'
As for the stream of alms he dispenses and the hospices he
has ordered to be built throughout his dominions to provide
food for all who come and go, that is something which no |
346other king has done except the Sultan Atabak Afrmad, 98 and
our master, God strengthen him, is his superior in giving food
to the poor every day and in giving grain to those hermits who
hide themselves away.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'Our master, God strengthen him, has
devised practices in benevolence and almsgiving of which no
one had thought and which the Sultans had not attained.
Among them are the constant distribution of alms to the poor
in every place in his realms; the designation of abundant alms
for prisoners in all his realms; the stipulation that those alms
should be in the form of baked bread that is easy to use;
clothing for the poor, the sick, old women, old men, and those
serving in the mosques throughout his realms; the allocation
of sacrificial animals for these classes of people for the Feast of
347 Sacrifice; | the giving in alms of the tolls exacted at the gates
in his realms on the twenty-seventh day of Ramadan in honour
of that noble day and in support of its sanctity; feeding the
people of the whole country on the night of the noble birth"
and assembling them for its ceremonies; the circumcision,

98 See II, pp. 288-90.

99 I.e. of the Prophet Muhammad on 12 Rabfl.

930
feeding and clothing of orphan boys on the day of'Ashura'; 100
his help to the chronically sick and infirm in providing them
with partners to work their land and so ease their burdens; his
giving to the poor in his capital soft rugs and wraps of good
quality for them to spread out and sleep on, an unparalleled
kindness; building hospitals in every town of his realms, pro-
viding ample endowments for feeding the sick, and appoint-
ing doctors | to cure them and take charge of their treatment, 348
as well as other kinds of beneficence and varieties of memor-
able acts which he has been the first to do. May God repay the
favours he has bestowed and recompense his benefactions.'
As for relieving the oppression of his subjects, he, God
strengthen him, ordered the total abolition of the tolls levied
on roads, disregarding the fact that it was an important tax.
What is with God is better and more lasting. 101 As for restraining
the hands of oppression, that is something well-known. I have
heard him, God strengthen him, say to his governors: 'Do not
oppress the people' and he used to reiterate this directive to
them.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'If the only instance of the benevo-
lence of our master, God strengthen him, towards his subjects
had been his abolition of the right of hospitality exercised
upon them by the collectors of zakdt and the provincial gov-
ernors, that alone would be | a manifest sign of his justice and 349
a shining light of beneficence. What can be said? He has
removed grievances and dispensed benefits that are beyond
computation. While this is being written a noble order has
been issued by him relieving prisoners of the heavy duties
exacted from them. How appropriate a kindness to them!
How typical of his clemency! This order embraced all the
provinces. In the same way he decreed the condign punish-
ment of qao!is and governors whose oppressive conduct was
proven, so driving out oppression and repelling the aggres-
sors.'
As for his actions in helping the people of al-Andalus in the
holy war, and protecting their frontiers by assisting them with
money, provisions and arms, destroying the preparations the
100 10 Mubarram, commemorating the death of tfusain b. 'All at the battle of
al-Karbala'.
101 Qur'an, sura xxviii, 60, and xlii, 36.

931
 FROM CHINA TO MOROCCO

350 enemy had made, and giving a display | of force, all that is
well-known and has not been forgotten in the Maghrib or in
the East, and no king has surpassed him.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'It is enough for anyone who wants to
know what support our master, God strengthen him, gave to
the Muslim countries and to defending them from the in-
fidels, to know what he did for the deliverance of Tarabalus
[Tripoli] in Ifriqiya. When the enemy gained possession of it
and extended over it the hand of tyranny, he, God strengthen
him, saw that, because of the distance, it was not feasible to
send troops to its assistance. He wrote to his subordinates in
the countries of Ifriqiya to ransom it with money, and this was
done for fifty thousand gold dinars in specie. When he heard
the news of this he said: Traise be to God Who has recovered
it from the hands of the infidels with this insignificant trifle.'
He at once ordered that sum to be sent to Ifriqiya, and the city
351 returned to Islam at his hands. 102 It did not occur to anyone
that five qintars of gold were an insignificant trifle till our
master, God strengthen him, acted with this surpassing gener-
osity and superb efficacy. Comparable deeds have been rare
among the kings and the story of what he had done impressed
them.
'Among the most widely known achievements of our master,
God strengthen him, in the holy war was to have built war
galleys along all the coasts, to have made ample provision in
naval matters, and to have done so in time of peace and a truce
in readiness for burdensome days, resolutely forestalling the
greed of the infidels. He reinforced this with the journey he,
God strengthen him, made in person to the mountains of
Janata103 last year to supervise the cutting of wood for ship-
building, to show the importance he attached to it and to
352 directing | personally what concerns the holy war, hoping for a
reward from God Most High and being sure of a splendid
recompense.'
Among the greatest of his charitable works, God strengthen

102 Tripoli was seized and looted by the Genoese admiral Filippo Doria in April
1355; it was ransomed with the help of Abu 'Inan in the following August for
50,000 gold doubloons (Brunschvig, I, p. 173).
103 Some MSS read Janaya. Not identified. It cannot be Djanet (Fort Charlet)
in the Tassili n'Ajjer mountains in eastern Algeria.

932
 BUILDINGS IN FEZ

him, were building the new mosque in the white city, the
capital of his exalted kingdom, a mosque distinguished by its
beauty, its sound construction, its radiance, and its wonderful
arrangement; building the great madrasa in the place known
as the Qa$r near the citadel of Fas [Fez], a building without
compare in the inhabited world for its extent, its beauty, its
uniqueness, its plentiful supply of water, and the beauty of
the site: 104 I have seen nothing like it among the madrasas of
Syria, Egypt, Iraq and Khurasan; building the great hospice
by the Chickpea Pond outside the white city, which is un-
equalled for its marvellous site and superb workmanship. The
most superb hospice I saw in the East is the hospice of353
Siryaqus, built by al-Malik al-Nasir, 105 but this is more splen-
did, more properly and more soundly constructed. May God,
glory to Him, assist our master, God strengthen him, in his
noble designs, recompense his pre-eminent virtues, prolong
his days for the sake of Islam and the Muslims, and assist his
victorious flags and standards. 106 Let us return to the narrative
of our travels.

104 The White, or Pure, City is New Fez, Fas al-Jadld. The mosque is the
Azhar, built in 1357. For the madrasa see I, p. 53 and n. 166; it is also illustrated
in the article 'Fas' in El2, pi. xii and xvi, and in Derek Hill, Islamic Architecture in
North Africa, pi. 311-23.
105 See I, p. 53 and n. 165.
106 Tnere is nothing to indicate precisely where each of Ibn Juzayy's interpola-
tions comes to an end. The whole of this encomium on Morocco and its ruler is
characteristic of the writings of the secretarial class to which he belonged.

933
 CHAPTER XXIV

Spain
hen it had happened to me to see this noble resi-

W dence and I had been overwhelmed by the favours of

his universal benevolence, I sought to visit my
mother's grave. I reached my native town of Tangier, visited
it, and went to the city of Sabta [Geuta], where I stayed for
some months. I was ill for three months. Then God cured me
and I wanted to take part in the holy war and the frontier
fighting. I sailed from Ceuta in a sAa&i1 belonging to the
354 people of Aslla [Arzila] and reached al-Andalus, God Most
High guard her, where the reward of those who live there is
abundant and where recompense is treasured up for those who
stay or travel there. This was just after the death of the
Christian tyrant Adfunus. 2 He besieged the mountain for ten
months and supposed he would get possession of all of al-
Andalus that still belonged to the Muslims. God took him
unprepared and he died of the plague, which he feared more
than anyone else.
The first town I saw in the Andalusian country was the
Mountain of Victory. 3 I met there the excellent preacher Abu
Zakariya' Yabya b. al-Siraj of Runda [Ronda], 4 and the qao1!
elsa al-Barbari, with whom I stayed. With him I made the
circuit of the mountain and saw the wonderful works con-
structed by our master Abu'l-fclasan, God be pleased with
him, the preparations he had made and the military equip-
ment, and what our master, God strengthen him, had added

1 A small two-masted ship, from Latin sagitta, 'arrow'.

2 Alfonso XI of Castile, who died on 20 March 1350 while besieging Gibraltar.
3 Gibraltar.
4 Yabya b. Ahmad Muhammad al-Nafsi al-Himyari of Ronda.

934
 GIBRALTAR

further. I would have liked | to be one of those serving there 355

till the end of my life.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'The Mountain of Victory is the
stronghold of Islam, a choking obstruction in the throats of
the worshippers of idols. It is a benefaction of our master
Abu'l-Hasan, God be pleased with him, with which his
name is associated; it is the work of piety he has placed
before him as a beacon, the arsenal of the holy war, and the
abode of the lions of the armies, 5 it is the frontier which has
smiled on the triumph of faith, and has made the people of al-
Andalus taste the sweetness of security after the bitterness of
fear; here the great conquest began; here Tariq b. Ziyad, the
freedman of Musa b. Nusair, landed after his crossing, and it
was named after him. It was called Jabal Tariq and Jabal Path,
because the conquest began from here. 6 The remains of the
wall that he and his companions built survives to this day and
is called the Arabs' Wall. 7 | I saw it when I was there during356
the siege of Al-Jazlra [Algeciras], 8 God restore it [to the
Muslims].
Our master Abu'l-Hasan, the favour of God be with him,
conquered it and recovered it from the hands of the Christians
after they had ruled it for twenty years and more. 9 He sent his
son, the illustrious amir Abu Malik, to besiege it, and helped
him with a great deal of money and numerous soldiers. It was
taken after a siege of six months in the year seven hundred
and thirty-three. 10 At that time it was not as it is now. Our
master Abu'l-tfasan, God's mercy on him, built the huge
Calahorra1 1 at the top of the fortress; till then there had only
been a small turret which was destroyed by stones from the

5 Another MS reads: 'where the foundations of armies are laid'.

6 Tariq landed in the Gibraltar area in the spring of 711 and defeated Roderick,
the Visigothic King, in the following summer.
7 It is unlikely that any substantial building was erected at the time of the
conquest. The 'Arabs' Wall' was almost certainly built in 1160.
8 Alfonso XI successfully besieged Algeciras in 1342 after his victory over
Abu'1 tfasan at the Rio Salado.
9 It had been taken for Ferdinand IV of Castile in 709/1309.
10 1333.
11 The French editors read al-ma'thara, which they translate 'tour', but note
that another MS reads al-qahira, i.e. the Victorious. Levi-Provengal (p. 205)
corrects this to q.lhurra, i.e. Calahorra.

935
 SPAIN

mangonels. He built the tower in its place. 12 He built there an

arsenal, which had been lacking before then, and a big wall
357 surrounding the Red Mound, going from | the arsenal to the
tileyard. Later on our master the Commander of the Faithful
Abu elnan, God strengthen him, renewed the fortifications
and their embellishments and built on to the wall at the end of
[the Mount] of Victory, which is the most effective of the
walls and the most generally useful. He sent ample munitions,
foodstuffs, and general supplies, acting to God Most High
with pious intent and sincere devotion.
In the last months of the year fifty-six13 there happened at
Mount of Victory something that showed sure signs and the
fruits of our master's reliance on God in his affairs, God streng-
then him; it was manifest proof of the sufficient blessedness
gathered together for him. The treacherous governor of the
Mount, may his end be degradation, elsa b. al-£Iasan b. Abl
Mandll, withdrew his criminal hand from obedience, diverged
from protecting the community (of the faithful), revealed his
358 hypocrisy, and rushed | into perfidy and dissension. 14 He
aspired to what was beyond his reach, being blind to the
beginning and end of his evil state. People imagined that this
was the beginning of a civil war, which it would require
precious treasure to extinguish and the raising of cavalry and
foot-soldiers to prevent. However, the blessed fortune of our
master, God strengthen him, decreed that these imaginings
should be vain. His steadfast integrity prescribed a wholly
unaccustomed end to this disturbance. After only a few days
the people of the Mount changed their minds, revolted
against the rebellious wretch, and became dutifully obedient.
They seized him and his son, who had aided him in hypocrisy,
12 The tower has survived and is still known as the Calahorra Tower, or the
Tower of Homage. Construction of an arsenal had begun during the Castilian
occupation. Most of the masonry in the wall 'from the arsenal to the tileyard' is
later than 1333. (H. T. Morris, 'The Early Islamic Settlement in Gibraltar',
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, XCI, pt 2, pp. 39-51.)
13 The last day of 756 was 14 December 1357.
14 'Isa b. al-Hasan b. 'All b. Abi al-Talaq was one of Abu 'Inan's most trusted
counsellors. When the fortifications of Gibraltar had been built he was made
governor of the Marinid possessions in Spain and paymaster of the garrisons. For
his revolt see Ibn Khaldun, Berberes, IV, pp. 307-10. He was executed in Decem-
ber 1355.

936
 A MODEL OF GIBRALTAR

and brought them, bound, to the exalted capital where the

sentence of God upon warmongers was executed upon them
both. God gave deliverance | from their evil. 359
When the fire of civil war was extinguished, our master,
God strengthen him, showed a concern for al-Andalus that its
people had not expected. He sent to the Mount of Victory his
son, the most fortunate, the blessed, the most rightly guided
Abu Bakr, called by the royal epithet al-Sacid [the Fortunate],
God Most High assist him. The Sultan sent with him the
bravest horsemen, the leading men of the tribes, and the most
capable footsoldiers. He gave them ample provisions, granted
them fiefs, freed their lands from dues, and overwhelmed
them with favours. His concern for the affairs of the Mount
was such that he, God strengthen him, ordered the construc-
tion of a model of the said Mount. In it were simulated the
walls, the turrets, the fortress, the gates, the arsenal, the
mosques, the magazines for munitions of war, the granaries,
the shape of the Mount and | the Red Mound adjoining it. 360
This was made in the auspicious audience hall. It is a wonder-
ful model, which the craftsmen made perfectly. Anyone who
has seen the Mount and has seen this model will recognize its
worth. This was only because of his eagerness, God streng-
then him, to inquire into the state of affairs there and his
concern to strengthen its fortifications and its readiness. God
Most High bring about the victory of Islam in the western
peninsula by his hands and realize his hope for the conquest of
the lands of the infidels and the scattering of the assembled
worshippers of the cross.
I recall in connection with this composition the words of the
eloquent man of letters, the distinguished poet Abu 'Abdallah
Muhammad b. Ghalib, of Rusafa, of Balanslya [Valencia], 15
God be merciful to him, when describing this blessed moun-
tain in his famous poem in praise of'Abd al-Mu'min b. 'All, 16
which begins:

15 Born at Valencia, lived at Granada, then at Malaga, died 1177, lhata, II, p.
505.
16 The first Almohad caliph and founder of the dynasty (r. 1130-63). By the
time he died he ruled over North Africa from TripoHtania to the Atlantic, as well
as Muslim Spain. He fortified Gibraltar in 1160 and named it Jabal Path, 'Moun-
tains of Victory'.

937
 SPAIN

361 | 17'Had you come to the fire of true guidance from the side of
al-Tur [i.e. Sinai]
You would have learnt all you wished of knowledge and illumi-
nation'
Describing the Mount in the poem with unprecedented ele-
gance he says, after describing the ships and the sea crossing:
Till the ships reached the mountain of the two victories, a
mountain exalted in rank, famed among mountains,
Looming, its aspect shrouded by a hood with an open collar of
clouds,
In the evening stars crown its parting, 18 hovering like dinars19 in
the air,
At times they stroke it with their superabundant locks, drawing
them across its temples,
362 A mountain that has lost its front teeth, which past ages have
worn away with biting on wood, 20
Made wise by experience, which has sucked the teats of the
ages, driving them before it as the chanting camelman drives his
caravan,
Hobbled, yet ever revolving in thought the wonders of the past
and of what is now to be seen,
It fell silent, gazing down, meditating, showing its inner peace,
its features covered in dust,
As if saddened because enslaved by fear of the two threats of
crushing and removal, 21

17 The verses that follow are from a poem quoted in full by 'Abd al-Wahid al-
MarrakushT in his history of the Almohads entitled al-Mtfjib fi talkhi$ akhbar al-
Ma^irib. This was edited by Dozy and translated into French by E. Fagnan as
Histoire des Almohades, Alger, 1895. Fagnan's version of the poem will be found on
pp. 186-8. I.B.'s text differs significantly from those published by Dozy (Leyden,
1817 and again, 1881) and by M. S. al-'Aryan and M. al-'Arabl (Cairo, 1949). I am
very much indebted to Professor J. D. Latham for his help in correcting and
explaining the text. Dozy remarked that the poet himself would have had diffi-
culty in explaining some of his lines. He was less than twenty years old when he
recited it before 'Abd al-Mu'min soon after the latter first came to Spain. The
preceding verses are concerned with his crossing of the strait from Ceuta.
18 A reference to the cleft in the peak, seen by the poet as a head of hair.
19 That is, gold coins.
20 Professor Latham notes that wood for arrows and other uses was tested by
biting on it to reveal flaws and other defects. The poet means that the rock has
tested men and events throughout history and has worn down its teeth testing
them.
21 An allusion to mountains being crushed (Qur'an, sura Ixix, 14) and moved
(Qur'an, sura Ixxxi, 3) on the Day of Judgment.

938
 RONDA AND MARBELLA

When other mountains tremble tomorrow may it be safe from

every peril.
After that in his poem he goes on to praise eAbd al-Mu'min b.
eAli.' Ibn | Juzayy remarks: 'Let us return to the words of the 353
shaikh Abu'Abdallah.'
I left the Mount of Victory for the city of Runda [Ronda],
which is one of the strongest22 and best sited Muslim strong-
holds. Its qd'id was then Shaikh Abu 'l-Rabf Sulaiman b.
Da'ud al-'Askari; 23 its qao!i was the son of my paternal uncle,
the jurist Abu '1-Qasim Muhammad b. Yahya b. Bappupa. I met
there the jurist, the qao1!, the man of letters Abu '1-Hajjaj
Yusuf b. Musa of Montejicar, 24 who lodged me in his house. I
also met there the preacher, the pious al-I^ajj, the excellent
Abu Isfraq Ibrahim, known as al-Shandarukh, who afterwards
died in the city of Sala in the Maghrib. I met there a group of
pious men, among them 'Abdallah al-§affar and others. I
stayed there for five days and then went to the city of Marbala
[Marbella]. | The road between these two cities is difficult and 364
very rough. Marbella is a pretty little town with abundant
supplies of food. I found there a cavalry troop goint to Malaqa
[Malaga], and I wished to travel in their company. God Most
High in His grace preserved me. They left before me and
were taken prisoner on the road, as we shall relate. I left in
their wake, and when I had gone beyond the limits of Mar-
bella and entered those of Suhail I passed a dead horse in a
ditch. Then I passed a basket of fish abandoned on the
ground. This alarmed me. The guardian's watchtower was in
front of me, and I said to myself: 'If the enemy had appeared
here the warden of the tower would have given warning.' I
went forward to a house and found in front of it a horse that
had been killed. While I was there I heard cries from behind
me. I had gone ahead of my companions, but I turned back
towards them. | I found the qffid of the Suhail fort with 365

22 Another MS reads: most spacious.

23 Abu Al-Rabf Sulaiman b. Da'ud al-'Askari, a vizier of Abu 'Inan, who
fought against the tfafsids in 1358 (Ibn Khaldun, Berberes, III, pp. 61-2, 159; Ibn
al-Ahmar, p. 82, n. 3).
24 Abu'1 Hajjaj Yusuf b. Musa al-Muntashaqari, i.e. of Montejicar, a poet, also
called al-Judhaml and al-Rundl, i.e. of Ronda (Durar, IV, 479; lAafa, IV, pp. 377-
90).

939
 SPAIN

them. 25 He informed me that four enemy war galleys had

appeared there, some of those manning them had landed, the
warden had not been in the tower, and horsemen coming from
Marbella, twelve in number, had passed by them. The Christ-
ians had killed one of them, one had fled, and ten had been
taken prisoner. A fisherman had been killed with them; it was
he whose basket I had found lying on the ground.
The qd'id advised me to stay the night in his station so that
he could conduct me to Malaga. I spent the night with him in
the fort of the frontier post named after Suhail, the aforesaid
war galleys being moored nearby. Next day the qa'id accom-
panied me on horseback and we reached the city of Malaga,
one of the capitals of al-Andalus and one of its finest cities,
366 combining | as it does the amenities of land and sea; it has
ample resources and fruits. I saw grapes sold in the bazaars at
eight pounds for a small dirham; its Murcian ruby-red pome-
granates have no equal in the world; its figs and almonds are
exported from Malaga and its neighbourhood to the East and
the West.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'This is what the preacher Abu
Muhammad eAbd al-Wahhab b. 'All of Malaga was referring to
when he wrote, in a witty play on words: 26
Malaqa, how many figs (finaha) you produce. Because of you
ships load (ya'ttnaha) them.
My doctor forbade (naha) you to me when I was ill, but he does
not have the equal (naha) of my life.
The communal qatfl Abu 'Abdallah b. eAbd al-Malik wrote a
postscript to this, using word-play: |
36? 'tfims! You will not forget its figs (finaha). Remember its
olives (zaydfinaha) as well.'
At Malaga is made the wonderful gilded pottery that is
exported to the remotest countries. The mosque is very big in
extent, and is famous for its sanctity. The courtyard is of

25 The Arabic name for the constellation Canopus. According to Yaqut it was
not visible in Andalus except from a hill near Malaga, which was therefore so
named. It is in fact an arabization of an older name. The fort was at Fuengirola.
26 These verses are quoted by the historian al-Maqqari with variants which
include a reference to Seville. He explains that it was known as Hims because so
many of its inhabitants had originally come from there.

940
 MALAGA AND GRANADA

unparalleled beauty with very tall bitter orange trees. When I

came to Malaga I found its qac-i the excellent preacher Abu
'Abdallah, of Tangier, 27 sitting in the Great Mosque. With
him were jurists and prominent citizens who were collecting
money for the ransom of the captives who have been men-
tioned. I said to him: 'Praise be to God Who protected me and
did not make me one of them.' I told him what had happened
to me after they had gone. He was astonished at it and offered
me hospitality, God be merciful to him. | The preacher Abu 368
'Abdallah al-Sahill, known as al-Mu'ammam (the Turban
Man)28 also offered me hospitality. I then travelled to the city
of Ballash [Velez], twenty-four miles away. It is a fine city
with a wonderful mosque. It has grapes, fruits and figs like
Malaga. I then went to al-Hamma [Alhama], 29 a little town
with a beautifully situated and wonderfully constructed mos-
que. There is a hot spring about a mile from the town on the
river bank; there is a bath house for men and another for
women. From there I went to the city of Gharnapa [Granada],
the capital of al-Andalus and the bride of its cities. Its sur-
roundings are unequalled in any country of the world. They
extend for forty miles and are divided by the famous Shannll
Uenil] river and many others. 30 It is surrounded on all sides by
orchards, gardens, meadows, palaces and vineyards. | One of 369
the wonderful places there is eAin al-Damae (the Fountain of
Tears), which is a mountain with meadows and orchards; 31
there is nowhere like it.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'If I were not afraid of being charged
with excessive local patriotism I would try to describe Granada,
since I have the opportunity. However, such is its fame that
there is no sense in speaking at length about it. What a
27 Abu Ja'far Ahmad b. 'Abdallah b. Ahmad al-Tanjali, preacher and imam of
the Malaga mosque, d. 1363 (Durar, I, p. 463, no. 192).
28 Abu 'Abdallah Muhammad b. Muhammad b. 'Abd al-Rahman b. Ibrahlm al-
Ansarl al-Sahill, born 1278/9, an eminent writer on religious questions, followed
his father as preacher at the principal mosque in Malaga, where he died in 1353
(Ihdta, HI, pp. 191-3). Some MSS of Ibn Baffupa call him al-Mu'ammar for al-
Mu'ammam; according to the Ihdta al-Mu'ammam was how he was known in
Malaga.
29 The name means 'hot spring'.
30 Other MSS read: 'other big rivers'.
31 It is marked on the map of Nasrid Granada, fig. 3, in Rachel Arid, L'Espagne
musulmane au temps des Nasrides, Paris, 1973.

941
 SPAIN

splendid poet is our shaikh Abu Bakr Muhammad b. Ahmad

b. Shlrin of Bust, 32 resident in Granada, when he says:
God guard Granada, place of repose, which rejoices the sad and
protects the exile
My friend is disgusted with it when he sees its meadows frosted
with snow |
370 It is the frontier (tha^if) and God protects those who settle
there; it is not the best mouth (thaghr) that is not cool.'
Account of the Sultan of Granada. The king of Granada at the
time I arrived was Sultan Abu '1-tfajjaj Yusuf, 33 son of the
Sultan Abu 'l-Walld Isma'Il, b. Faraj, b. Isma'Tl, b. Yusuf, b.
Nasr. I did not meet him because of an illness he had, but his
nobly born, pious and excellent mother sent me some gold
dinars, of which I made good use.
In Granada I met a number of its eminent men, among them
the communal qao1!, the noble and eloquent Abu '1-Qasim
Muhammad b. Ahmad. b. Muhammad al-Uusainl of Ceuta; 34
the jurist, the professor, the learned preacher Abu 'Abdallah
Muhammad b. Ibrahlm of Bayyan [Baena];35 the learned
3?iQur'an reader, the preacher, Abu | Said Faraj b. Qasim,
famous as Ibn Lubb;36 the communal qag1!, the rarity of the
age and masterpiece of the times, Abu '1-Barakat Muhammad
b. Muhammad b. Ibrahlm al-Salami, al-BalaebaeI. 37 He had

32 Another MS reads Muhammad b. Bashir b. al-Sibtl, i.e. of Ceuta. Bust is in

Afghanistan.
33 Reigned 1333 54. The genealogy is correct.
34 Abu'1 Qasim Muhammad b. Ahmad al-Husaim of Ceuta, died as qadl in
Granada in 1358-9 (Dibaj, II, pp. 267-8).
35 Abu 'Abdallah Mubammad b. IbrahTm of Baena, died in 1353 as a professor
(mudarris) in the Madrasa Nasriya and preacher in the Mansura mosque in
Granada (Durar, III, p. 295; Dibaj, pp. 276-7).
36 Abu Sa'Id Faraj b. Qasim b. Lubb (i.e. Lope) al-Tha'labl, also famous as a
poet; d. 1381-2. At this time he was a professor at the Madrasa Nasriya in Granada
(Jhata, IV, p. 253, where he is called al-Taghlib! instead of al-Tha'labl; Dibdj, II,
pp. 139-42; Nat/a/'iMAaj, p. 219.
37 Abu'1 Barakat Mubammad b. Mubammad b. Ibrahlm al-Salami al-Balfiql,
i.e. of Velefique, a small town in Almeria province. The French editors read al-
Bala'bal, of which there are variants in other MSS. Born in 1264-5, d. 1370. He
was successively qadl of Malaga, of Almeria, of Granada and again of Almeria.
(Durar, IV, pp. 155-7; Ijd(a, II, p. 101; Dibaj, II, pp. 269-74; Nail al-ibtihaj, pp.
254-5). He was evidently the source of some of the information about Ibn Baipupa
quoted in the Durar from Lisan al-Dln ibn al-Khafib, see I, ix. The garden was in
the village of Nabla near Granada.

942
 IBN JUZAYY MEETS IBN BATTIJTA

come from Almariya [Almeria] recently. I encountered him in

the garden of the jurist Abu '1-Qasim Muhammad, son of the
jurist and eminent secretary Abu 'Abdallah b. 'Asim. 38 We
stayed there for two days and a night.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'I was with them in that garden. Shaikh
Abu 'Abdallah delighted us with the story of his travels. I took
down from him the names of famous people he had met, and
we profited greatly from him. A group of the notable people of
Granada were with us, among them the gifted poet, the re-
markable Abu Jaefar Afcmad b. Ri^wan b. eAbd al-'A?im al-
Judhaml. 39 | The story of this young man is astonishing. He 372
grew up in the countryside, did not study or frequent the
learned, yet he came to write excellent poetry of a quality rare
among masters of eloquence and eminent men of letters, for
example:
You who have made my heart your home, its door is the eye that
glances at it
My insomnia opened the door after you left. Send your spectre
who will lock it.'40
I also met in Granada the shaikh of the shaikhs and of the
Sufis, the jurist Abu 'All *Omar, son of the pious shaikh, the
saint Abu 'Abdallah Muhammad, b. al-Mahruq (the Burnt). I
stayed for some days in his hospice outside Granada; he treated
me with the utmost respect. I went with him to visit the hospice
of renowned sanctity known as the Station of the Eagle. The
Eagle is a hill overlooking the environs of Granada, | about 373
eighty miles away. It is close to the ruined city of Iblra
[Elvira]. 41 I also met his nephew the jurist Abu '1-Hasan 'All
b. Ahmad b. al-Mahruq in his hospice known as The

38 Muhammad b. Muhammad b. 'Asim b. Muhammad b. Abi 'Asim al-Ansafi,

Abu 'Abdallah, known as Ibn 'Asim, 1297-1342 (Durar, IV, p. 180).
39 See Durar, I, p. 141.
40 Ibn Hajar al-eAsqaIanI quotes these lines with the difference of one word and
gives a longer genealogy ((Durar, I, pp. 131-2); he says that al-Judhaml was a
peasant (falldf}}.
41 The hospice was to the west of Granada. The French editors read al-Tlra,
but another MS has al-BIra which is obviously correct. Elvira, about 10 km NW of
Granada, at the foot of the Sierra de Elvira, had been the principal city of the
district but declined in the llth century, when the Zirid dynasty made Granada
their capital. Gibb remarked that no place called Tira 'seems to be mentioned in
any Spanish Arabic work' (Selection), p. 376, n. 6).

943
 SPAIN

Bridle, which is at the top of the suburb of Najd outside

Granada and adjoining Mount Sablka (the Ingot). He is the
shaikh of the petty traders among the faqirs. In Granada is a
group of foreign faqirs who have settled there because it is
like their own country; among them are al-Hajj Abu eAbdal-
lah of Samarqand, al-Hajj Afcmad of Tabriz, al-tfajj Ibrahim
of Quniya [Konya], al-Hajj Uusain of Khurasan, and the two
Hajjls 'All and Rashid, the Indians, and others. I went from
Granada to yamma, then to Velez, then to Malaga, and then
to the fortress of Dhakwan, which is a beautiful place,
374abounding in water, trees and fruit. 42 I then went to Runda,
then to the village of the Banu Riyafr, where I stayed with its
shaikh Abu '1-I^asan "All b. Sulaiman al-Riyafri. He is one of
the most generous men and most excellent of the notables;
he provides food for all comers and he offered me splendid
hospitality. Then I went to the Mount of Victory and em-
barked in the galley in which I had previously made the
crossing, and which belonged to the people of Arzila. I arrived
at Geuta; its qa'id at that time was Shaikh Abu Mahdi elsa b.
Sulaiman b. Mansur; its qao1! was the jurist Abu Muhammad
al-Zajandari. Then I went to Arzila, where I stayed some
months, then to the city of Sala. From Sala I travelled to the
city of Marrakush.
It is one of the most beautiful cities, spacious and extending
over a very wide area, and has ample resources. It has magnifi-
cent mosques, like the principal mosque, which is known as
375 the Kutublyln Mosque (Mosque of the Booksellers). | It has a
wonderful awe-inspiring minaret, which I climbed and from
which the whole town can be seen. However, ruin has over-
taken it and I can compare it only with Baghdad, except that
the bazaars of Baghdad are better. In Marrakush is the won-
derful madrasa distinguished by the beauty of its site and the
excellence of its construction, which was built by our master
the Commander of the Faithful Abu '1-yasan, God be pleased
with him.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'The qa^T of Marrakush, the imam and
historian Abu 1-Ausi 'Abdallah Muhammad b. 'Abd al-Malik,43
said of it:

42 Coin, some 40 km west of Malaga. See Levi-Proven^al, p. 222, n. 1.

944
 MARRAKUSH

Cod's be the illuatfious town of Manlkinh

How splendid are the noble sayyids who live there!
If i stranger from there
It: consoles him with its friendliness for his people and home |
Whit mud of it 3%
Give rise to en¥f between the eye md the etr, f

** Abfl 'AbdalUh Mubamomd b. Mutyunmd b. *Abd al-Malik b. Said al-

Ansirlal-AusT, Mirtkush, bora. 1237 II, p. 32S).

945
 CHAPTER XXV

The Country of the Blacks

left Marrakush in the company of the exalted cortege, that

I of our master, God strengthen him, and we reached the

city of Sala [Sallee], then the city of Miknasa [Meknes],
the wonderful, the green, the brilliant, with orchards and
gardens and with plantations of olives surrounding it on all
sides. Then we arrived at the capital, Fa's [Fez], God Most
High guard it. There I said farewell to our master, God
strengthen him, and set out on a journey to the country of the
Blacks. I reached the city of Sijilmasa, a very beautiful city. 1
It has abundant dates of good quality. The city of al-Basra is
like it in the abundance of dates, but those of Sijilmasa are
superior. The irar kind is unequalled anywhere. 2 Here I
377 stayed with the jurist Abu Murmmmad al-Bushri, | whose
brother I had met at Qanjanfu in China. 3 How far apart they
are! He treated me with the greatest generosity. Here I
bought camels and four months' fodder for them.
On the first day of God's month of Muharram in the year
fifty-three4 I travelled in a caravan whose leader was Abu
Muhammad Yandakan al-MassufT, God be merciful to him.
There were a number of merchants from Sijilmasa and other
places in the caravan. After twenty-five days we reached
Taghaza. It is a village with no attractions. A strange thing
1 It was destroyed in the next century. The ruins are west of Rissani in Tafilelt,
on the left bank of the Ziz. The route is circuitous. It has been suggested that, if
I.B.'s journey had political significance, he may have needed to take instructions
from the Sultan, or that disturbances caused by the BanQ Ma'qil made it impos-
sible to travel through the western Atlas and the Sous valley (R. Mauny, Textes et
documents, p. 54, n. 6).
2 Dr James Bynon informs me that this is a Berber word meaning dates that
ripen early.
3 See p. 900.
4 14 February 1352.

946
 TAGHAZA

about it is that its houses and mosque are built of blocks of salt
and roofed with camel skins. 5 There are no trees, only sand in
which is a salt mine. They dig the ground and thick slabs are
found in it, lying on each other as if they had been cut | and 378
stacked under the ground. A camel carries two slabs. The only
people living there are the slaves of the Massufa, who dig for
the salt and live on dates brought to them from Darea6 and
Sijilmasa, camel meat, and anli, 7 which is imported from the
country of the Blacks. The Blacks come from their country to
Taghaza and take away the salt. A load of it is sold at Iwalatan
[Walata]8 for eight to ten mithqals, and in the city of Malll for
twenty to thirty, sometimes forty. The Blacks trade with salt
as others trade with gold and silver; they cut it in pieces and
buy and sell with these. For all its squalor qintars of qintars of
gold dust are traded there.
We spent ten days there, under strain, | for the water is 379
brackish and it is the place with most flies. Here water is taken
in for the journey into the desert which lies beyond. It is ten
days' travel with no water, or only rarely. We, however, did
find plentiful water in pools left by the rain. One day we found
a pool between two hills of rock which was sweet; we quen-
ched our thirst and washed our clothes. Truffles9 are plentiful
in that desert, "and so are lice, so much so that people wear
round their necks string necklaces containing mercury, which
kills them. 10
In those days we used to go in front of the caravan and when
we found a suitable place we pastured the animals there. We
went on doing this till a man called Ibn Zlri was lost in the

5 The salt workings were abandoned in the sixteenth century, but the ruins of
these structures are still visible. Houses built of salt on the borders of the Sahara
are mentioned by Herodotus and Pliny; there was not enough rain to cause them
to disintegrate.
6 I.e. the WadI Dar'a (Oued Dara) which drains the southern slopes of the
Anti-Atlas.
7 Pennisetum typhoideum, a millet.
8 Iwalatan is 'a berberization of the Malinke name' and Walata 'an arabization
of the Malinke word wala - "shady spot"' (Hunwick, Sharfa in Songkay, p. 14, n.
5).
9 The desert truffle, tirfas, Terfozia. This is one of the most arid parts of the
Sahara.
10 Arab physicians used mercury in the treatment of skin diseases, and oint-
ments containing mercury can be effective against cutaneous parasites.

947
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

380 desert. After that I did not go ahead | or fall behind the
caravan. There had been a quarrel between Ibn Zlri and the
son of his paternal uncle called Ibn eAdI and they had ex-
changed insults, so Ibn Zirl had fallen behind the caravan and
lost his way. When the caravan halted there was no news of
him. I advised his cousin to hire one of the Massufa to follow
his tracks and perhaps find him, but he refused. Next day a
man of the Massufa offered to look for him, without payment.
He found his tracks; sometimes they followed the route and
sometimes they did not, but he came upon no news of him.
We met a caravan on the way. They told us that some men
had become separated from them; they had found one of them
dead under one of the bushes that grow in the sand. He had
his clothes on him and a whip in his hand. There was water
about a mile away. |
381 We then came to Tasarahla, where there is underground
water. 11 Caravans stop there for three days. They rest, repair
and fill their waterskins, and sew onto them coarse bags to
protect them from the wind. The takshtf"is sent forward from
here.
Account of the takshtf. Takshif'\s the name given to any man of
the Massufa whom the people of the caravan hire to go ahead
of them to Iwalatan with letters from them to their friends
there asking them to let houses to them and come four days'
journey to meet them with water. Anyone who has no friend
in Iwalatan writes to a merchant there known for his benevol-
ent character who then enters into the same relationship with
382 him. Sometimes | the takshtf perishes in this desert and the
people of Iwalatan know nothing of the caravan, and its
people or most of them perish too. There are many demons in
that desert. If the takshtf is alone they play tricks on him and
delude him till he loses his way and perishes. There is no road
to be seen in the desert and no track, only sand blown about
by the wind. You see mountains of sand in one place, then you
see they have moved to another.
A guide there is someone who has frequented it repeatedly
and has keen intelligence. A strange thing I saw is that our
11 The only well on the route from Taghaza to Walata is Bir al-Kusaib, 250 km
from the former and 480 km from the latter (Mauny, Textes et documents, p. 38, n.
4).

948
 SAHARAN TRAVEL

guide was blind in one eye and diseased in the other, but he
knew the route better than anybody else. 12 The takshif we
hired for this journey cost a hundred mithqals of gold. He was
one of the Massufa. On the night of the seventh day we saw
the lights of those | who had come to meet us, and we were 383
extremely pleased.
This desert is luminous, radiant, one's chest is dilated, one
is in good spirits, and it is safe from robbers. There are many
wild cattle. 13 A troop of them will approach so near that the
people can hunt them with dogs and wooden arrows. How-
ever, eating their meat produces thirst and so many people
avoid it. It is remarkable that if these cattle are killed water is
found in their stomachs. I have seen the Massufa squeezing
the stomach and drinking the water in it. There are also many
snakes in this desert.
Anecdote. There was in the caravan a merchant of Tilimsan
known as al-Hajj Zaiyan. He had a habit of taking hold of
these snakes and playing about with them. I had told him not
to do this | but he did not stop. One day he put his hand into 384
a lizard's hole to pull it out and found a snake there instead.
He grasped it in his hand and was going to mount his horse but
it bit the index finger of his right hand, giving him severe
pain. It was cauterized, but in the evening the pain grew
worse. He cut the throat of a camel and put his hand in its
stomach and left it there for the night. The flesh of his finger
dropped off and he cut off his finger at the base. The Massufa
told me that the snake had drunk water before biting him; if
not the bite would have killed him. l4
When the people coming to meet us with water had reached
us, our mounts were given drink. We entered an extremely
hot desert, not like the one we had experienced. We used to
set off after the afternoon prayer, travel all night and halt | in 385

12 There are many references to blind guides in the desert in Arabic literature.
'The Arabs know by smelling the Earth where the Water lays and and are seldom
known to mistake the Spot' (Denham in E. W. Bovill, Missions to the Niger, III, p.
546).
13 Addax nasomaculatus.
14 The snake was probably a horned viper, Cerastes cornutus, but other poison­
ous snakes occur in the Sahara. Similar treatment is practised in the Setif region
of Algeria with the warm stomach of a chicken (Mauny, Textes et documents, p. 40,
n. 5).

949
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

the morning. Men from the Massufa and Bardama15 and other
tribes used to bring us loads of water for sale. We reached the
city of Iwalatan at the beginning of the month of Rabfl 16 after
a journey of two full months from Sijilmasa. It is the first
district of the country of the Blacks. The Sultan's deputy
there was Farba tfusain; farbd means 'deputy'. 17
When we arrived the merchants deposited their goods in an
open space and the Blacks took responsibility for them. The
merchants went to the Farba who was sitting on a rug under a
shelter; his officials were in front of him with spears and bows
in their hands. The Massufa notables were behind him. The
merchants stood in front of him and he spoke to them through
an interpreter as a sign of his contempt for them, although
they were close to him. 18 At this I was sorry I had come to their
386 country, because of their bad | manners and contempt for
white people. I made for the house of the Ibn Badda', a kind
man of Sala to whom I had written asking him to let a house to
me, which he did.
The inspector of Iwalatan, named Mansha Ju, 19 invited
those who had come in the caravan to a reception, but I
refused to be present. My companions urged me very strongly
to accept, and I went with the rest. At the reception coarsely
ground anti was served mixed with a little honey and curdled
milk. This was put in a half gourd which they had made like a
large bowl. Those present drank and then left. I said to them:
'Is it for this that the Blacks invited us?' They said: 'Yes. For

15 Bardam is the name given by the Fulani to the Tuareg in general and to the
nobles especially (H. Lhote, 'Recherehes sur Takedda', Bulletin de flnstitut
Fondamental de fAfrique Noire, t. xxxiv, no. 3, p. 429, n. 1). It may represent the
tribal name Iberdianen (Rodd, People of the Veil, p. 428) or Iberdiyanan (H. T.
Morris, The Tuaregs, p. 4).
16 17 April 1352.
17 The Malinke and Bamana term for a slave of the king sent to supervise or
replace a local headman (Monteil, Les Empires du Mali, pp. 23-4). It was also the
title of the head of the king's slaves and chief of his household (Levtzion, Ancient
Ghana and Mali, p. 112).
18 Though tarjuman means 'interpreter, translator', the use of an interlocutor
was normal in the Sudanic courts and did not signify contempt. Thus the envoy
of the Sultan of Egypt to Mansa Musa of Mali records that he was received with
the utmost courtesy, but that the king, who spoke Arabic perfectly, talked to him
through an interlocutor (Monteil, Les Empires du Mali, pp. 107-8).
19 mansa dyon, royal slave. The inspector (mushrif) was a representative of the
Sultan with the provincial governor.

950
 IWALATAN

them it is the greatest hospitality.' 20 I then became convinced

that no good was to be hoped for from these people, and I
wanted to join | the pilgrims travelling from Iwalatan, but 1387
decided to go and see the capital of their king. I stayed in
Iwalatan about fifty days. Its people treated me with respect
and gave me hospitality. Among them were the qatfi of the
town Muhammad b. 'Abdallah b. Yanumar, and his brother the
jurist and professor Yafcya. The town of Iwalatan is extremely
hot. There are a few small palms and they sow melons in their
shade. Water comes from underground sources. Mutton is
plentiful. Their clothes are of fine quality and Egyptian origin.
Most of the inhabitants belong to the Massufa. The women are
of outstanding beauty and are more highly regarded than the
men.
Account of the Massufa inhabitants of Iwalatan. Conditions
among these people | are remarkable and their life style is 388
strange. The men have no jealousy. No one takes his name
from his father, but from his maternal uncle. Sons do not
inherit, only sister's sons! 21 This is something I have seen
nowhere in the world except among the infidel Indians of al-
Mulaibar. Nevertheless these people are Muslims. They are
strict in observing the prayers, studying the religious law, and
memorizing the Qur'an. Their women have no shame before
men and do not veil themselves, yet they are punctilious
about their prayers. Anyone who wants to take a wife among
them does so, but they do not travel with their husbands, and
even if one of them wished to, her family would prevent her.
Women there have friends and companions among men out-
side the prohibited degrees for marriage, and in the same way
men I have women friends in the same category. A man goes 389

20 The constituents of the rneal signified that no black arts would be used
against the guest and that he would behave loyally (Hamdun and King, Ibn
Battuta in Black Africa, p. 70, n. 29).
21 'Matrilineal forms of succession, more particularly a man's inheritance by his
sister's son, ... survived in the Air Sultanate until the sixteenth century, if not
later' (Norris, The Tuareg, pp. 198-9). 'A man's status in Air, as elsewhere among
the Tuareg, is determined by the caste and allegiance of his mother. Survivals of
a matriarchal state of society are numerous among the People of the Veil. They
colour the whole life of the race' (Rodd, People of the Veil, p. 148). In I.B.'s time
the Massufa, akin to the Tuareg, had not yet been displaced in the western
Sahara by the Banu Hassan Arabs.

951
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

into his house, finds his wife with her man friend, and does
not disapprove.
Anecdote. One day I called upon the qao1! at Iwalatan after he
had given permission for me to enter. I found him with a
young and exceptionally beautiful woman. When I saw her I
hesitated and was going to go back, but she laughed at me and
showed no embarrassment. The qadl said to me: 'Why are you
turning back? She is my friend.' I was astonished at them, for
he was a jurist and a liajj. I learnt that he had asked the
Sultan's permission to go on pilgrimage that year with his
female companion. I do not know whether this was the one or
not, but permission was not given. |
ywComparable anecdote. One day I called on Abu Muhammad
Yandakan al-Massufi, in whose company we had arrived, and
found him sitting on a rug. In the middle of the room was a
canopied couch and upon it was a woman with a man sitting
and talking together. I said to him: 'Who is this woman?' He
said: 'She is my wife.' I said: 'What about the man who is with
her?' He said: 'He is her friend.' I said: 'Are you happy about
this, you who have lived in our country and know the content
of the religious law?' He said: 'The companionship of women
and men among us is a good thing and an agreeable practice,
which causes no suspicion; they are not like the women of
your country.' I was astonished at his silliness. I left him and
did not visit him again. Afterwards he invited me a number of
times but I did not accept.
391 When I decided to travel | to Mail!, which is twenty-four
days' journey from Iwalatan for one who hurries, I hired a
Massufa guide. There is no need to travel in a caravan for the
road is safe. I set out with three of my companions. The road
has many trees of great age and size; a caravan can shelter
under a single one of them. 22 Some of them have no branches
or leaves but the trunk gives enough shade to shelter men.
Some of these trees have rotted inside and rainwater has
collected there, as if it were a well. People drink this water. In
some of these trees are bees and honey, which people collect.
I passed by one of these trees and found a man inside

22 The tree is the baobab, Adansonia digjtata. The trunk can reach 25 ft in
circumference and is often excavated, as the wood is soft.

952
 FRUITS AND VEGETABLES IN MALLI

weaving; he had set up his loom and was weaving. I was

amazed at him.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'In Andalus there are two chestnut
trees | and in the hollow trunk of each of them is a weaver 392
making cloth; one of them is on the slope of WadI Ash
[Guadix], the other in Bushshara [Alpujarras] in Granada.'
In this jungle between Iwalatan and Mall! are trees whose
fruits resemble plums, apples, peaches and apricots, but they
are not exactly the same. There are trees whose fruits are like
large cucumbers. When it ripens the fruit splits open uncover-
ing something like meal, which they cook and eat and sell in
the bazaars. 23 They take out of the ground grains like beans
which they fry and eat; their flavour is like fried chickpeas. 24
Sometimes they grind them to make something like a fritter,
which is fried with gharfi?* which is fruit like a very sweet
plum, but it is bad for white people if they eat it. They crush
the kernels and extract from them an oil for which they have |
several uses, among which they cook with it, feed lamps with 393
it, fry their fritters with it, anoint themselves with it, and mix
it with an earth they have and plaster their houses with it, in
the way lime is used. 26 It is plentiful among them and is easy
to get. It is carried from one town to another in big calabashes;
one of these calabashes holds what a jar holds in our country. 27
In the country of the Blacks the calabashes are huge; from
them they make bowls, cutting a calabash into two parts and
making two bowls from it. They decorate them beautifully. If
one of them goes on a journey he is followed by his slaves and
slave-girls carrying his bedding and his vessels for eating and
drinking, which are calabashes.
The traveller in these countries does not carry food or
23 The fruit of the baobab. 'The white mealy part of the fruit is very pleasant to
the taste, and forms, with water, an agreeable acidulous beverage; which the
natives, whose libidinous propensities incline them to such remarks, allege to
possess the virtue of relieving impotency' (Clapperton in Bovill, Missions to the
Niger, IV, p. 617).
24 Voandzeia subterranea, or voandzou.
25 The karite or shea butter tree, Butyrespermum Parkii.
26 'When ripe, the outer pulpy part is eaten, and the kernels, previously well
bruised, are boiled in water, when the fat rising to the surface is skimmed off. It
is not used in food, but only to burn in lamps' (Clapperton in Bovill, Missions to the
Niger, IV, p. 711).
27 qulla, a very large jar with a pointed base.

953
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

394 condiments or dinars or dirhams, but only | pieces of salt, glass

trinkets, which people call na%m, and some articles of perfum-
ery. Among these they prefer cloves, mastic and tdsarghant, 2*
which is their incense. When he arrives at a village the black
women come with anli, curds, chickens, flour of nabaq, rice,
/»»i, which is like mustard seed and from which they make
couscous, eatfda, and lubiyff bean flour. 29 He buys what he
wants of these, but eating the rice is bad for white people; funt
is better.
After travelling for ten days from Iwalatan we reached the
village of Zaghari, 30 which is a big village inhabited by black
merchants called wanjarata.^ Along with them live a number
395 of white people who belong to the | IbaoT sect of the Khariji
and are called $aghanaghu. 32 The Sunn! Malikis among the
whites are called Tuns among them. 33 From this village an/tis
imported to Iwalatan. We left Zaghari and reached the great
river, the Nile, 34 on which is the town of Karsakhu. 35 The
Nile descends from there to Kabara and then to Zagha. 36 In
Kabara and Zagha are two Sultans who obey the king of Mall!.
The people of Zagha adopted Islam long ago; they are devout
and eager for religious knowledge. From Zagha the Nile
28 The root of Corrigfola telephifolia. The name is Berber.
29 nabaq is zizyphys spina Christi; funi is fonio, digttaria exi/is, a cereal resembling
semolina; couscous will be well known to anyone who has visited NW Africa;
'a$ida is a porridge of flour and herbs; lubiya' is the name of several kinds of bean,
notably Vigna sinensis, similar to the haricot.
30 The name represents Malinke Diaghara, Fula Diagari, western Massina.
The village meant may be Diabali east of Sokolo, where there are old ruins
(Mauny, Textes et documents, p. 46, n. 9).
31 An alternative name for the dyulas, traders, usually itinerant and often
associated with Islamic proselytizing.
32 For the IbadTs see II, p. 397, n. 102. The Saghanughu are a Malinke clan, at
one time IbadI, later MalikT, closely associated with the propagation of Islam (M.
Hiskett, The Development of Islam in West Africa p. 45).
33 Ture, a word of Soninke origin meaning 'foreigner', and the name of another
marabutic clan of the Malinke.
34 The Niger was still identified with the Nile by John Barrow in the early
nineteenth century.
35 Perhaps Kara Sakho, 'Kara Market', on the Niger above Diafarabe.
36 Evidently not the Kabara which is the river port of Timbuktu. It has been
identified with Diafarabe (M. Delafosse, 'Le Gaza et le Mali et Pemplacement de
leurs capitales', Bulletin du Comite fetudes historiques et scientifiques de fA.O.F.,
1924, p. 526). Zagha is often said to be Dia or Diagha, a short distance below
Diafarabe on the Niger, at the beginning of the Massina flood plain, but see n. 40
below.

954
 COURSE OF THE NILE

descends to Timbuktu [Timbuktu] and then to Kaukau

[Gao], of both of which we shall speak later. Then it flows to
the town of Mull37 in the country of the Limis, which is the
last district of Malll, then to Yufi, 38 which is one of the biggest
towns | of the Blacks and whose Sultan is one of their most 3%
powerful Sultans. No white man goes there because they kill
him before he reaches it. Then it flows down to the country of
the Nubians, who are Christians, then to Dunqula [Dongola],
the biggest of their towns. Its Sultan is called Ibn Kanz al-Din;
he became a Muslim in the time of al-Malik al-Nasir. 39 Then
it flows down to the Cataracts, which is the frontier district of
the Blacks and the first district of Aswan in the Sa'id of Egypt.
At this place on the Nile I saw a crocodile near the bank
looking like a little boat. One day I went down to the Nile to
satisfy a need and one of the Blacks came and stood in the
space between me and the river; I was amazed at his appalling
manners and lack of decency. I mentioned it to someone, who
said: 'He did that only to protect you from the crocodile by 397
putting himself between you and it.' We left Karsakhu and
came to the §ansara river which is about ten miles from
Mail!. 40 It is the custom that no one enters the city without
37 Gibb (Selections, p. 379, n. 14) accepts Cooley's identification of Muli with
Muri on the Niger (The Negrolandof the Arabs, p. 90), which is the Niamey district,
but not all scholars agree (Mauny, Textes et documents, p. 48, n. 7).
38 Yufi is often identified with Nupe. However, I.E. (II, p. 380) has spoken of
it as being a month's journey from Sufala (Sofala in Mozambique) and a source of
gold dust. This implies that Yufi included Zimbabwe, where gold was mined, not
collected as dust. The Limis are mentioned in the same passage as having
tattooed faces like those coming from Janawa, i.e. Guinea. The name is a variant
of Lamlam, applied by Arab geographers to cannibal and allegedly cannibal tribes
south of the Sudanic belt.
39 As so often I.B.'s history is at fault. Kanz al-Daula (not al-Din) was the title
of the chief of the Banu Kanz, a tribe occupying territory south of, and at times
including, Aswan. He was, of course, a Muslim, but not a convert to Islam. He
became the first Muslim king of Muqurra, the northern Muslim kingdom whose
capital was Dongola, about 1319. The Christian kings who preceded him had for
some time been vassals of the Mamluk Sultans of Egypt (P. M. Holt, 'The
Coronation Oaths of the Nubian Kings', Sudanic Africa, I, 1990, pp. 5-9). Kanz al-
Daula became king during the third reign of al-Malik al-Nasir Muhammad as
Sultan of Egypt.
40 There has been much controversy over the location of the capital of the
empire of Mali. Many have argued for Niami and would identify the Sansara with
the Sankarani, a right bank tributary of the Niger. C. Meillassoux, in a paper read
to the International Conference on Manding Studies at the School of Oriental and
African Studies, London, 1972, claimed that I.E. travelled south-west from

955
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

permission. I had written beforehand to a number of the white

people and their chief Muhammad, son of the jurist al-juzull,
and to Shams al-Dln b. Naqwlsh, 41 the Egyptian, asking them
to rent a house for me. When I reached the said river I crossed
it by the ford, and no one prevented me. I arrived in the city
of Mail!, the capital of the king of the Blacks, alighted at the
cemetery, and proceeded to the quarter of the white people,
where I sought out Muhammad Ibn al-Faqlh. I found that he
had rented a house for me opposite his own. I went there and
his son-in-law, the jurist and Qur'an reader rAbd al-Wahid
398 came with a candle and food. Then next day Ibn al-Faqih,
Shams al-Dln [b.] al-NaqwIsh, and 'All al-Zudl of Marrakush,
who is a scholar, carne to me. I met the qac«i of Malll, eAbd al-
Rabman, who came to me; he is a Black, a Hajj, an excellent
man with noble qualities; he sent me a cow as a welcoming
gift. I met the dragoman Dugha,42 one of the most disting-
uished and important of the Blacks; he sent me a bull. The
jurist 'Abd al-Watiid sent me two bags offuni and a calabash of
gharii. Ibn al-Faqlh sent me rice andfuat. Shams al-Dln sent
me a welcoming gift. They provided for me completely. God
recompense their kindnesses. Ibn al-Faqlh was married to the
daughter of the Sultan's paternal uncle and she concerned
herself with our food and other needs.
399 Ten days after our arrival we ate *asida made from some-
thing like taro called qdfi, which is the food they prefer to all
others. 43 All six of us were taken ill and one of us died. I
attended the dawn prayer and fainted while it was in progress.
I asked one of the Egyptians for a laxative and he brought me
something called baidar,** made from the roots of plants,
mixed it with aniseed and sugar and stirred it in water. I drank

Walata, that Zaghari (n. 36 above) is Diara in Futa Kingui, and that the capital of
Mali was on the Gambia. Hunwick has concluded, partly because of the time
taken for the journey, that Zaghari was near Sokolo and that the site of Mali must
be sought between Segu and Bamako ('The Mid-Fourteenth Century Capital of
Matt, Journal of African History, XIV, ii, 1975, pp. 195-206). Further archeologi-
cal examination of the whole region is needed.
41 Other MSS read Naghris and Naqris.
42 His name means 'vulture' in Bamana.
3 The yam, Dioscorea, kahe in Fula. Taro needs to be carefully washed and
cooked for a long time before being eaten.
44 Not identified.

956
 THE SULTAN OF MALLl

it and vomited what I had eaten together with much bile. God
spared me from death but I was ill for two months.
Account of the Sultan of Mdllt. He is the Sultan Mansa Sulai-
man; mansa means sul(an4s and Sulaiman is his personal name.
He is a miserly king and a big gift is not to be expected from
him. It happened that | I spent all this time in Malli without400
seeing him because of my illness. Then he arranged a mourn-
ing meal for our master Abu'l-tfasan, God be pleased with
him, to which he invited the amirs, jurists, qaoTs, and the
preacher, and I went with them. They brought the Qur'an
cases and the whole Qur'an was read. They prayed for our
master Abu'l-tfasan, God be merciful to him, and for Mansa
Sulaiman. When this was over I advanced and greeted Mansa
Sulaiman. The qa^I, the preacher and Ibn al-Faqlh told him
about me, and he replied in their language. They said to me:
'The Sultan says to you "Give thanks to God".' I said: 'Praise
and thanks be to God in all circumstances.'
Account of their meagre hospitality and exaggerated opinion of it.
When I had left a gift of welcome was sent to me. It was sent
to the qaoTs house; he sent it with | his men to Ibn al-Faqih's40i
house. He came out hurrying and barefoot and came in to me.
He said: 'Stand up! The Sultan's things and his gift have come
for you.' I stood up, supposing them to be robes of honour and
money, but there were three rounds of bread, a piece of beef
fried mgbarff, and a calabash with curdled milk. When I saw it
I laughed and was greatly surprised at their feeble intelligence
and exaggerated opinion of something contemptible.
Account of what I said to the Sultan afterwards and of his kindness
to me. After I had received this gift I spent two months during
which nothing reached me from the Sultan. The month of
Ramadan began and in the meantime I had been going repeat-
edly to | the audience hall, greeting him, and sitting with the 402
qao1 ! and the preacher. I talked to Dugha the dragoman, who
said: 'Speak in his presence. I shall explain on your behalf
what is necessary.' He held an audience in the first days of
Ramadan. I stood before him and said: 'I have travelled
through the countries of the world and I have met their kings.
45 Mansa is a Malinke and Bamana word which at this time designated the
supreme ruler. Sulaiman, brother of the famous Mansa Musa, reigned for some
twenty years or more and died in 1360.

957
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

I have been in your country for four months, but you have not
treated me as a guest, and you have not given me anything.
What am I to say about you before (other) Sultans?' He said: 'I
have not seen you and I know nothing about you.' The qa\ll
and Ibn al-Faqlh stood up and answered him, saying: 'He
greeted you and you sent food to him.' Thereupon he ordered
that a house should be provided for my lodging, and my
current expenses. On the night of the twenty-seventh of
Ramadan he distributed money to the qagli, the preacher and
the jurists, which they call zakdt^ and he gave me at the same
time thirty-three and a third mithqals. When I left he gave me
a hundred mithqals of gold. |
403 Account of his audience in his cupola. He has a raised cupola the
door of which is in his house and where he sits most of the
time. On the side of the audience hall are three arches of wood
covered with silver plates, below which are three more,
covered with plates of gold, or silver gilt. They have curtains
of blanket cloth. On a day when there is an audience in the
cupola, the curtains are raised and it is known that there is a
session. When he takes his seat a silk tassel is put through the
grill of one of the arches, to which is tied a striped Egyptian
handkerchief. When people see the handkerchief drums are
beaten and trumpets sounded. Then some three hundred
slaves come out from the door of the palace, some with bows
in their hands and some with short spears and leather shields.
404 The spearmen stand on the right and left; the archers sit | in
the same way. Then two saddled and bridled horses are
brought and with them two rams. They say that they are
useful against the evil eye. When he takes his seat three of his
slaves run and call his deputy Qanja Musa. The farariya, 47
who are the amirs, come, and the preacher and the jurists who
all sit in front of the armed men on the right and left of the
audience hall. Dugha the dragoman stands at the door of the
audience hall, dressed in splendid clothes of zardkhand** and
other fabrics; on his head is a turban with borders, arranged

46 I.B. implies that the word is used in an unusual sense; properly, it means the
alms that are obligatory under the religious law. The eve of 27 Ramadan is known
aS 4^e 'N'S011 of Power' when the petitions of the truly pious are granted.
^ Military commanders, an arabicized plural of Malinke/<m, 'brave man'.
A brocaded fabric with animal designs, made especially in Alexandria.

958
 CEREMONIAL IN MALLI

with exceptional artistry; he is girded with a sword with a gold

scabbard; on his feet are boots and spurs. No one except him
wears boots that day. In his hand he has two short spears, one
of gold and the other silver, tipped with iron. The soldiers,
the governors, the pages and the Massufa and the rest sit4os
outside the audience hall in a wide thoroughfare with trees.
Each farari has in front of him his men with spears, bows,
drums, trumpets made from elephants' tusks, and musical
instruments made from reeds and gourds, which are struck
with sticks and make a pleasant sound. Each farari has his
quiver hung between his shoulders and his bow in his hand.
He is on a horse; some of his men are on horseback, some on
foot. A man stands in the audience hall under the arches. If
anyone wishes to speak to the Sultan he speaks to Dugha, who
speaks to that man, and he speaks to the Sultan.
Account of the session in the audience hall. On some days he also
sits in the audience hall. There is a bench under a tree, which
has three steps and which is called banbi.** \ It is covered with406
silk and cushions are placed on it. A parasol, that is to say,
something like a silken cupola, is raised over it. On top of it is
a gold bird the size of a falcon. The Sultan comes out of a door
in a corner of the palace with his bow in his hand, his quiver
between his shoulders, a gold skull-cap on his head held in
place by a gold headband with points like thin knives, longer
than a span. He is mostly dressed in a hairy, red tunic of the
European cloth called mufanfas. 50 He comes out preceded by
singers with gold and silver qanbaras.^ He is followed by
about three hundred armed slaves. He walks slowly and often
pauses, and sometimes stands still. When he reaches the banbi
he stops and looks at the people. Then he climbs up it slowly
as the preacher climbs the pulpit. When | he takes his seat the 40?
drums are beaten and the trumpets and bugles sounded.
Three slaves come out running and summon the Sultan's
deputy and the fararis, who enter and sit down. Two horses
and rams are brought. Dugha stands at the gate and the rest of
the people are in the street under the trees.
49 Malinke bembe, platform, Banana bambali, platform of beaten earth.
50 This fabric has not been precisely identified.
51 A rudimentary lute, the genbru or genbiri of Moroccan popular music. For a
detailed description see Mauny, Textes et documents, p. 55, n. 4.

959
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

Account of the humility of the Blacks before their king, how they
pour dust on themselves, and other things about them. The Blacks
are the most respectful of people to their king and abase
themselves most before him. They swear by him, saying
Mansd Sulaimdn kt. 5Z If he summons one of them at his session
in the cupola we have mentioned, the man summoned re-
moves his robe and puts on a shabby one, takes off his turban,
408 puts on a dirty skull-cap and goes in | with his robe and his
trousers lifted half way to his knees. He comes forward hum-
bly and abjectly, and strikes the ground hard with his elbows.
He stands as if he were prostrating himself in prayer, and
hears what the Sultan says like this. If one of them speaks to
the Sultan and he answers him, he takes his robe off his back,
and throws dust on his head and back like someone making
his ablutions with water. I was astonished that they did not
blind themselves.
When the Sultan makes a speech in his audience those
present take off their turbans from their heads and listen in
silence. Sometimes one of them stands before him, recounts
what he has done for his service, and says: 'On such and such
a day I did such and such, and I killed so and so on such and
such a day.' Those who know vouch for the truth of that and
he does it in this way. One of them draws the string of his
bow, then lets it go as he would do if he were shooting. If the
409 Sultan says to him: 'You are right' | or thanks him, he takes off
his robe and pours dust on himself. That is good manners
among them.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'I was told by the keeper of the signet
the jurist Abu'l-Qasim b. Ritfwan, 53 God make him great, that
when the Hajj Musa al-Wanjaratl came as a messenger from
Mansa Sulaiman to our master Abu'l-tfasan, God be pleased
with him, and he entered the noble assembly, one of the
people with him carried a basin of dust, which he poured on
himself whenever our master spoke graciously to him, as he
used to do in his own country.'

52 Malinke 'King Sulaiman has ordered'.

53 Abu'1 Qasim 'Abdallah b. Yusuf b. Ridwan al-Bukhan al-KhazrajT, also called
al-Najjari. A native of Malaga who served as secretary to several Marinid Sultans
and as $dhib al-'alama, writer of the decorative signature on documents, to Abu
'Inan (Ibn al-Ahmar, p. 83).

960
 CEREMONIES IN MALLI

Account of what he did about the prayer on the Feast and on the Feast
days. I was in Mail! for the Feasts of Sacrifice and of Breaking
the Fast. The people went out to the prayer ground which is
near the palace | of the Sultan, wearing fine white clothes. 410
The Sultan is on horseback with the (ailasdn on his head. 54
The Blacks wear the (ailasdn only for the Feast Day, except
that the qatfi, the preacher and the jurists wear it on other
days. On the Feast Day these go in front of the Sultan calling
out: 'There is no God but God' and 'God is most great.*
Before him are flags of red silk. A tent was erected in the
prayer-ground; the Sultan went in and made himself ready.
Then he came out onto the prayer-ground, the prayer was
recited and the sermon delivered. Then the preacher came
down, sat in front of the Sultan and spoke at length. A man
was there with a spear in his hand explaining to the people
what the preacher said in their own language. What he said
comprised admonitions, warnings, praise of the Sultan, exhor-
tations on the need to obey him, and to accord him his due. |
On the two Feasts the Sultan sits on the banlri after the-tii
afternoon prayer. The armour bearers come with splendid
weapons, quivers of gold and silver, swords ornamented in
gold, as are the scabbards, spears of gold and silver, and maces
of crystal. 55 Four amirs stand by his head driving off the flies;
in their hands they have a silver ornament like a stirrup. The
fardrfs, the qao1!, and the preacher are seated according to
custom. Dugha the dragoman comes in with his four wives
and his concubines, who are about a hundred, in fine clothes;
on their heads are gold and silver bands with gold and silver
apples attached to them.
A chair is placed for Dugha, where he sits playing an instru-
ment made from reeds | with tiny calabashes underneath. He 412
sings poems praising the Sultan and recounting his campaigns
and his exploits. His wives and concubines sing with him and
play with the bows. With them are some thirty slave-boys
dressed in tunics of red blanket-cloth with white skull-caps on
their heads. Each one of them has his drum hung from his
neck and beats it. Then come young companions of his who

54 A light veil covering the head and shoulders.

55 Perhaps beryl rather than crystal.

961
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

play and turn over in the air, as the Sindis do. In this they
show remarkable grace and agility. They play with swords
most elegantly. Dugha plays with his sword with exceptional
skill, the Sultan orders a gift to be given him, and a purse is
brought containing two hundred mithqals of gold-dust. He is
told what is in it in front of all the people. Thefarans stand up
and bend their bows as a sign of thanks to the Sultan. Next
413 day each of them gives Dugha a gift according to his ability.
Every Friday after the afternoon prayer Dugha repeats the
ceremony we have described.
Account of the comical way poetry is recited to the Sultan. On the
Feast Day when Dugha has finished his playing, the poets
come in. They are called////*/, each one being aja/t. 56 Each of
them is inside a costume made of feathers resembling the
shaqshdq on which is a wooden head with a red beak like the
head of the shaqshdq. 57 They stand before the Sultan in this
laughable get-up and recite their poems. I have been told that
their poetry is a sort of admonition. They say to the Sultan:
'This banbi, formerly such and such a king sat on it and
414 performed noble actions, | and so and so did such and such; do
you do noble acts which will be recounted after you.'
Then the chief poet climbs the steps of the banbi and puts
his head in the Sultan's lap; then he climbs to the top of the
banbi and puts his head on the Sultan's right shoulder, then on
his left shoulder, talking all the time in their language. Then
he comes down. I have been told that this custom has con-
tinued among them since ancient times before Islam, and that
they have persisted in it.
Anecdote. One day when I was present at the Sultan's assembly
a jurist came forward who had come from a distant province.
He stood before the Sultan and spoke at length. The qadl
stood and confirmed what he had said. Then the Sultan stated
his agreement. Each of them took off his turban and covered
415 himself with dust before the Sultan. | A white man was by my
side and he said: 'Do you know what they said?' I said: 'I do
not.' He said: 'The jurist stated that locusts had attacked their

56 Malinke dyeli, bard, griot.

57 The green woodpecker, but the bird represented may have been the horn-
bill, Bucerbus abyssinicus.

962
 JUDGMENTS OF THE SULTAN

province, and that one of the pious men had gone to the place
where they were and had been dismayed at what he saw. He
had said, "There are very many of these locusts." A locust had
answered him, "God sends us to destroy the crops of a pro-
vince where there is great injustice."' The qao1! and the Sultan
confirmed what he had said. The Sultan thereupon said to the
amirs: 'I am innocent of injustice and I punish any of you who
are guilty of it. Whoever knows of injustice and does not
inform me of it is himself guilty of it and is answerable for that
injustice. God will be his reckoner and will call him to
account.' When he said this thefararfs took off their turbans
and declared themselves innocent of injustice. |
Anecdote. I was present one Friday when a Massufa merchant 416
and student of theology, named Abu Hafs, stood up and said:
'People of the mosque, I call you to witness that I call to
account Mansa Sulaiman whom I summon before the Prophet
of God, God's blessing and peace be upon him.' When he said
this a group of men came out from the Sultan's enclosure and
said to him: 'Who has wronged you? Who has taken something
from you?' He said: 'Mansha Ju of Iwalatan (that is to say the
inspector) took from me something worth six hundred mith-
qals and wanted to give me only one hundred mithqals in
compensation.' The Sultan sent for him at once; he arrived
after a few days and they were both referred to the qag1!, who
conceded his rights to the merchant, who received them,
while the inspector was removed from his post. |
Anecdote. While I was staying in Mall! it happened that the4i?
Sultan became angry with his senior wife, the daughter of his
paternal uncle, who was entitled Qasa, a word which means
'queen* among them. 58 In accordance with the custom of the
Blacks she shares in the kingdom and her name is mentioned
along with his in the pulpit. 59 She was confined in the house
of one ofthefararls, and the Sultan replaced her with his other
wife, Banju, who was not a king's daughter. People talked
much about this and disapproved of what he had done. His

58 Malinke kasa, the chief wife of a ruler.

59 'We may be in this narrative witnessing the Sultan's attempt to replace the
African type of queen by the consort-type of queen, a person who owed her
position to her husband' (Said Hamdun and Noel King, Ibn Battuta in Black Africa,
p. 78, n. 59).

963
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

uncle's daughters came to congratulate Banju on becoming

queen; they put ashes on their arms, but they did not put dust
on their heads. Later, the Sultan released Qasa from confine-
ment and his uncle's daughters came to congratulate her on
her release, pouring dust on themselves in the customary way.
418 Banju complained to the Sultan about this | and he was angry
with his cousins. They were afraid of him and sought refuge in
the congregational mosque. However, he pardoned them and
invited them to see him. It is their custom to take off their
clothes and come naked into his presence, which they did. He
was pleased with them, and for seven days they kept on
coming to the Sultan's gate, morning and evening, for this is
what people do whom he has pardoned.
Every day Qasa rode out with her girl- and boy-slaves with
dust on their heads. She used to stop by the audience hall,
with her face veiled so that it could not be seen. The amirs
talked much about her, and the Sultan assembled them in the
audience hall and Dugha said to them in their language: 'You
have spoken much about Qasa. She has committed a great
crime.' One of her slave-girls was brought in, shackled with
her hands chained to her neck. She was told to say what she
419 knew. She related | that Qasa had sent her to Japal,60 the son
of the Sultan's paternal uncle, who was a fugitive from him in
Kanburnl, 61 to invite him to depose the Sultan. She had said
to him: 'I and all the troops obey you.' When the amirs heard
that they said: 'This is a great crime and she deserves to be
killed.' Qasa was frightened and took refuge in the preacher's
house. Their custom is to take refuge in the mosque, and if
that is not possible, in the preacher's house.
The Blacks disliked Mansa Sulaiman because of his avarice.
Before him was Mansa Magha, and before Mansa Magha was
Mansa Musa, 62 who was generous and virtuous. He loved the
white people and did them favours. He it was who gave to

60 Probably Malinke dyata, a lion. He may be the prince who later ruled as Mari
Diata II (? 1360-74), who was the son of Mansa Magha, Sulaiman's nephew and
predecessor.
^ Perhaps Konbere in the Bendugu region beyond the Bani river.
62 The most famous of the rulers of Mali. During his reign (probably 1307-32
or 1312-37) he made a celebrated pilgrimage to Mecca. He was succeeded, first
by his son Magha, then by his brother Sulaiman.

964
 GENEROSITY OF MANSA MUSA

Abu Isfcaq al-Sabill63 on one day four thousand mithqals. A

trustworthy person told me that he gave Mudrik b. Faqqus
three thousand | mithqals in a single day; his grandfather420
Saraq Japa64 had become a Muslim through the grandfather of
this Mudrik.
Anecdote. This jurist Mudrik told me that one of the people
of Tilimsan known as Ibn Shaikh al-Laban had made a pre-
sent to the Sultan Mansa Musa in his youth of seven mithqals
and a third. He was then only a stripling and of no conse-
quence. Later, it happened that Ibn Shaikh al-Laban came to
him in connection with a lawsuit. He was now the Sultan. He
recognized him, called him, brought him near, and made him
sit beside him on the banbi. Then he made him repeat what he
had done to him, and said to the amirs: 'What reward should
he have who has done the generous deed he has done?' They
said: 'A benefit ten times as great. Give him seventy
mithqals.'65 Thereupon he gave seven hundred mithqals, a
robe, slaves of both sexes, | and ordered him not to leave him. 421
I was told this story by the son of Ibn Shaikh al-Laban, who
was one of the learned teaching the Qur'an in Mall!.
Account of what Ifound good and what Ifound bad in the conduct of
the Blacks. Among their good practices are their avoidance of
injustice; there is no people more averse to it, and their Sultan
does not allow anyone to practise it in any measure; the
universal security in their country, for neither the traveller
nor the resident there has to fear thieves or bandits: they do
not interfere with the property of white men who die in their
country, even if it amounts to vast sums; they just leave it in
the hands of a trustworthy white man until whoever is
entitled to it takes possession of it: their punctiliousness in 422

63 Abu Isbaq Ibrahim b. Muhammad al-Sahili al-Ansari of Granada, poet, man

of letters and jurist. He accompanied Mansa Musa on the pilgrimage, returned to

Mali with him, was the architect of several buildings in the capital and in
Timbuktu, where he settled. He died in 1346. He was known as al-Tuwaijin, 'the
little cooking-pan', but it is not known why. 0- O. Hunwick, 'An Andalusian in
Mali', Paideuma, XXXVI, 1990, pp. 59-66).
64 Another MS reads Mar Jata. I.E. refers to Marl Jata, better known as
Sundiata, the legendary founder of the empire of Mali. The genealogy and
chronology of the early rulers of the dynasty are very uncertain. Mansa Musa's
father Abu Bakr was the brother, or possibly the uterine nephew, of Sundiata.
65 'Whoever brings a good deed shall receive ten like it', Qur'an, sura vi, 160.

965
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

praying, their perseverance in joining the congregation, and

in compelling their children to do so; if a man does not come
early to the mosque he will not find a place to pray because of
the dense crowd; it is customary for each man to send his
servant with his prayer-mat to spread it out in a place reserved
for him until he goes to the mosque himself; their prayer-mats
are made of the leaves of a tree like the date-palm, but which
has no fruit. 66 They dress in clean white clothes on Fridays; if
one of them has only a threadbare shirt he washes it and cleans
it and wears it for prayer on Friday. They pay great attention
to memorizing the Holy Qur'an. If their children appear to be
backward in learning it they put shackles on them and do not
remove them till they learn it. I called on the qao1! on the
423 Feast Day. His children | were in shackles. I said to him: 'Are
you not going to free them?' He said: 'Not till they learn the
Qur'an by heart.' One day I passed by a handsome youth, who
was very well dressed, with a heavy shackle on his foot. I said
to the person with me: 'What has he done? Has he killed
someone?' The youth understood what I said and laughed. I
was told: 'He has been shackled to make him memorize the
Qur'an.'
Among their bad practices are that the women servants,
slave-girls and young daughters appear naked before people,
exposing their genitals. I used to see many like this in Rama-
tfan, for it is customary for thcfararfs to break the fast in the
Sultan's palace, where their food is brought to them by twenty
424or more slave-girls, who are naked. | Women who come before
the Sultan are naked and unveiled, and so are his daughters.
On the night of the twenty-seventh of Ramadan I have seen
about a hundred naked slave-girls come out of his palace with
food; with them were two daughters of the Sultan with full
breasts and they too had no veil. They put dust and ashes on
their heads as a matter of good manners. There is the clown-
ing we have described when poets recite their works. Many of
them eat carrion, dogs and donkeys. 67
Account of my departure from Mdlti. I arrived there on the
fourteenth of Jumada the First in the year fifty-three and left

66 The palmyra palm may be meant; it does not bear fruit.

67 All forbidden food under the religious law.

966
 THE HIPPOPOTAMUS

on the twenty-second of Muharram in the year fifty-four. 68 I

was accompanied by a merchant named Abu | Bakr b. Ya'qub. 425
We took the Mima road. 69 I rode a camel, for horses are very
dear, one costing a hundred mithqals. 70 We came to a big
channel which runs from the Nile and can be crossed only in
boats. That place abounds in mosquitoes and no one passes it
except by night. We reached the channel in the first third of
the night, which was moonlit.
Account of the horses there are in the Nile. When we reached the
channel I saw on the bank sixteen beasts with huge bodies. I
wondered at them and supposed they were elephants, which are
numerous there. Then I saw they had gone into the river. I said
to Abu Bakr b. Ya'qub: 'What are these beasts?' He said: 'They
are hippopotamuses which have come out j to graze on land.'426
They are bigger than horses, they have manes and tails, their
heads are like horses' heads, and their feet are like elephants'
feet. I saw them another time when I was sailing on the Nile
from Tunbuktu to Kawkaw. They swim in the river and lift
their heads and blow. The boatmen were afraid of them and
drew near to land to avoid being drowned by them. They have
an ingenious trick for hunting them. They have spears pierced
with holes through which they put strong cords. They strike the
hippopotamus with them and, if the blow strikes the foot or the
neck it pierces right through and they pull on the rope till it
comes to the bank when they kill the hippopotamus and eat the
flesh. 71 There are many of the bones lying on the bank.
We stopped by the channel in a big village whose governor
was a black tfajj, an excellent man named Farba | Magha. He42?
was one of those who had accompanied the Sultan Mansa
Musa when he went on pilgrimage.
Anecdote. Farba Magha told me that when Mansa Musa
reached this channel there was with him a white qao1 ! sur-
named Abu'l-eAbbas, known as al-Dukkall. 72 The Sultan gave
68 29 June 1352 and 28 February 1353.
69 Mema is the name given by the Soninke to a ruined site near Nampala in
northern Massina.
70 Perhaps because of the prevalence of the tsetse fly in this region.
71 This method of hunting the hippopotamus was still employed at the begin-
ning of the twentieth century.
72 Probably Abu Said 'Othman al-Dukkali, i.e. of the Dukkala tribe of
Morocco, who claimed to have lived in Mali for thirty-five years.

967
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

him four thousand mithqals for his expenses. When they

reached Mima he complained to the Sultan that the four
thousand mithqals had been stolen from him in his house.
The Sultan sent for the amir of Mima and threatened him with
death if he did not produce the thief. The amir sought for the
thief and did not find him, for there are no thieves in that
country. He went to the qaoTs house and rigorously examined
his servants, and threatened them. One of the slave-girls said
428 to him: 'Nothing is lost, but he buried it | with his own hand
in that place.' She indicated the place and the amir dug them
up, took them to the Sultan, and told him what had hap-
pened. The Sultan was angry with the qao1! and banished him
to the country of the infidels who eat the sons of Adam. 73 He
spent four years there, then the Sultan brought him back to
his own country. The infidels had not eaten him because he
was white, for they say that eating a white man is harmful
because he is unripe. They claim that a Black is ripe.
Anecdote. A group of these Blacks who eat the sons of Adam
came to the Sultan Mansa Sulaiman with their amir. It is their
custom to put in their ears big pendants, the opening of each
pendant being half a span across. They wrap themselves in
429 silk and in their country is | a gold mine. The Sultan treated
them with honour and gave them in hospitality a slave woman,
whom they killed and ate. They smeared their faces and
hands with her blood and came to the Sultan to thank him. I
was told that this is their custom whenever they come on an
embassy to him. It was reported of them that they used to say
that the best parts of the flesh of human females were the
palm of the hand and the breast.
We travelled from this village by the channel and reached
the town of Quri Mansa. 74 Here the camel I was riding died.

73 'The head-hunting and cannibal tribes are located in the central pagan belt
extending from Yola to the confines of Zaria province' (C. K. Meek, The Northern
Tribes of Nigeria, 1925, II, p. 48). Thirty-four cannibal tribes are listed, and the
same author notes that among the non-cannibal peoples we find many traces of
former cannibal customs. It is related by al-'Omari that a merchant gave some salt
to apagan king of the Blacks and in return was sent two young women for him to eat.
74 Not identified. Some translators have taken the first part of the name to
mean 'villages' (qura) and understand the phrase as 'the built-up area of the
villages of Mansa'. However, I.B. spells out the vowelling as gun; he would not
have bothered to spell out the vowels of such a common word as qura.

968
 TUNBUKTU

The driver told me this and I went out to look at it. I found
that the Blacks had already eaten it in accordance with their
practice of eating carrion. 75 I sent two young men whom I had
hired for my service to buy a camel for me at Zaghari, which is
two days' journey away. Some of Abu Bakr b. Ya'qub's com-
panions stayed with me, while he went to await us at Mima. 430
I spent six days receiving the hospitality of tfajjis in this town,
until the two young men arrived with the camel.
Anecdote. One night while I was staying in this town I saw in
my sleep a person who said to me: 'Oh Muhammad ibn
Batpupa, why do you not recite the sura Ya Sin76 every night?'
Since then I have not failed to recite it every day, whether I
have been travelling or stationary.
Then I travelled to the town of Mima. We alighted near
some wells outside the town. Then we travelled to the city of
Tunbuktu [Timbuktu] which is four miles from the Nile.
Most of the inhabitants are Massufa, the people of the
lithdm. 17 Their governor is named Farba Musa. I was present
one day when he promoted | one of the Massufa to be amir of 431
a group. He gave him a robe, turban and trousers, all coloured,
and seated him on a leather shield. The chiefs of the tribe
lifted it up above their heads. In this town is the grave of the
illustrious poet Abu Ishaq al-Sahill of Granada, known in his
own country as al-Tuwaijin ('the little cooking pan'), 78 and
also of Siraj al-Din b. al-Kuwaik, 79 one of the great merchants
among the people of Alexandria.
Anecdote. When the Sultan Mansa Musa went on pilgrimage he
stopped at a garden that belonged to this Siraj al-Din at Birkat
al-Habash ('the pool of the Abyssinians') outside Cairo, 80
which is where the Sultan alights. He was in need of money
and borrowed it from Siraj al-Din; the amirs also borrowed
from him. Siraj al-Din sent his agent with them to recover the

75 See p. 966 above.

76 Sura xxxvi of the Qur'an, traditionally recited over the dead or dying.
77 The veil covering the face below the eyes, worn by Tuareg men.
78 See n. 63 above.
79 'Abd al-Latlf b. Ahmad b. Mahmud b. Abi'l Path b. Mahmud b. Abi'l
Qasim, Siraj al-Din ibn al-Kuwaik (1260/1-1334), a wealthy merchant of Alexan-
dria, originally from Takrit (Durar, II, p. 415).
80 The location of this pool is known; it was south of Fustat. Some MSS read
Birkat al-Khashsh.

969
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

432 money but he stayed in Malll. | Then Siraj al-Dm himself

went with his son to recover the money. When he reached
Timbuktu he was given hospitality by Abu Ishaq al-Saliili. It
was fated that he should die that night. People talked about it
and suspected he had been poisoned. His son said to them: 'I
was with him and ate exactly the same food that he ate. If it
had been poisoned we should both have been killed, but his
appointed time had come.' His son went to MallT, recovered
the money, and went back to Egypt. 81
At Tunbuktu I embarked on the Nile in a little boat hol-
lowed out from a single piece of wood. Every night we stop-
ped at a village where we used to buy the food and butter we
needed, paying with salt, aromatics and glass trinkets. We
reached a town whose name I have forgotten; the amir was an
excellent man, a Hajj, named Farba Sulaiman, famous for his
433 courage and strength; nobody tries to pluck his bow. I saw
none of the Blacks taller or with a bigger body than he. In this
town I needed a little millet so I went to him. That day was
the birthday of the Prophet of God,82 God's blessing and
peace on him; I greeted him and he asked me about my visit.
There was with him a jurist who acted as his secretary. I took
a tablet that was in front of him and wrote on it: 'Jurist, tell
this amir that we need a little millet for our provisions. Greet-
ings.' I handed over the tablet to the jurist for him to read to
himself and then recount to the amir in their language, but he
read it aloud and the amir understood it. He took me by the
hand and brought me into his audience hall, where there were
many weapons, leather shields, bows, and spears. I found he
434 had the Kitdb al-mudhish of Ibn al-jauzl83 and I began to read
it. I was brought a drink which they call daqnu, which is water
and pounded millet mixed with a little honey or curdled

81 According to another version Siraj al-Dln lent Musa 30,000 dinars and sent
two successive agents to Mali to recover them, but they both died there. He then
sent his son Fakhr al-Dln Abu Ja'far and a third agent, but Musa died and they
recovered nothing (Monteil, Les Empires du Mali, p. 113).
82 12 Rabf 1754/25 August 1353.
83 Kitdb al-mudhish ffl-muhddarat, 'The Book of Amazing Retorts', by Abu'I
Faraj 'Abd al-Rahman b. <A17 of Baghdad, known as Ibn al-jauzl, a HanbalT jurist
who died in 1200/1201. It is a miscellany of Qur'anic, legal and historical
apothegms.

970
 KAUKAU

milk. 84 They drink this instead of water because, if they drink

plain water, it is bad for them. If they cannot find millet they
mix it with honey or curdled milk. Then they brought a water-
melon and we ate some of it.
A five span high85 slave-boy came in. The amir called him
and said to me: 'This is your welcoming gift. Guard him so
that he does not escape. 1 I accepted him and wanted to leave,
but he said: 'Stay till food is brought.' A slave-girl of his, a
Damascene Arab, came to us and spoke to me in Arabic.
While this was going on we heard crying inside his house. He
sent the girl to find out what was happening. She came back
and told him that one of his daughters had died. He said: 'I |
do not like lamentations. Come, let us go to the river', mean-435
ing the Nile. He has houses on its banks. A horse was brought
and he said to me: 'Mount.' I said: 'I shall not ride when you
walk.' We walked together and came to his houses by the
Nile, where food was brought. We ate and I said farewell to
him, and left. I saw no one among the Blacks more generous
and more admirable than he. The boy he gave me is still with
me to this day.
I travelled to the city of Kaukau [Gao] on the Nile. It is one
of the finest and biggest cities of the Blacks, and best supplied
with provisions. It has plentiful rice, curds, chickens, fish and
has the *tabby' cucumber, which is incomparable. 86 Its inhabi-
tants transact business, buying and selling, with cowries, as do
the people of Malll. I stayed there about a month and received
hospitality from | Muhammad b. 'Ornar, one of the people of 436
Miknasa, a witty, jocular and admirable man, who died there
after I had left; al-Hajj Muhammad al-Wajdi of Taza, one of
those who visited al-Yaman, and the jurist Muhammad al-
FilalT, imam of the mosque of the white people.

84 As Cooley noted (The Negrvlandofthe Arabs, London, 1841, p. 85, n. 38) this is
Caille's dokhnou, described as 'un melange de farine de mil et de miel que Ton delate
pour ensuite le boire' (R. Caille, Un Voyaged Tombouctou, Paris 1830, II, p. 236).
85 A phrase used to indicate that he was not fully grown, when he would be six
spans high.
86 faqqus 'inani. Gibb follows the French editors in translating/^^ as 'cucum-
ber' (Selections, p. 334). Mauny has 'melon' (Textes et documents, p. 72). All leave
'inanf untranslated as the name of a variety. Dozy, Supplement aux dictionnaires
arabes, II, p. 95, proposes to read 'attain, 'tabby', the name of a variegated fabric,
and cites an instance of its being applied to a kind of melon.

971
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

I travelled from there overland in the direction of Takadda87

with a big caravan of people from Ghadamas. Their guide and
leader was al-Hajj Wujjm, which means 'wolf in the language
of the Blacks. 88 I had a camel for riding and a she-camel to
carry provisions. When we had covered the first stage the she-
camel came to a stop. Al-I4ajj Wujjln took what she had been
carrying and divided it among his companions who distributed
it among themselves. There was in the caravan a MaghribI
from the people of Tadala89 who refused to carry any of it as
others had done. One day my slave-boy was thirsty and I
437 asked | this man for water, but he gave him none.
We then came to the country of the Bardama, who are a
Berber tribe. 90 Caravans travel only under their protection,
and in this connection women are more important than men.
They are nomads and do not stay in one place. Their tents are
strange in form. They set up wooden poles and put matting on
them. On top of these they put a network of poles, which they
cover with skins or strips of cotton. Their women are the most
perfectly beautiful of women and have the most elegant
figures; they are pure white and very fat. I have not seen in
the country any who are as fat. They feed on cows' milk and
pounded millet, which they drink mixed with water, un-
cooked, night and morning. Anyone who wants to marry
among them settles with them as near to their country as
438 possible | and does not go with them further than Kaukau and
Iwalatan.
In this country I fell ill from the extreme heat and excess of
bile. We hastened our march to reach the city of Takadda. I
lodged there near the shaikh of the MaghribTs, Sa*Id b. eAl! al-
Juzull. 91 I received hospitality from the qacli Abu Ibrahim

87
Tigidda is a common place name, or constituent of place names, in the Ayar
(Air) region. There has been much controversy over the identification of I.B.'s
Takadda, but it now seems fairly certain that it was Azelik. (Djibo M. Hamani, Au
Carrefourdu Soudan etde la Berbtrie: le sultanat Touaregde FAyar, 1989, pp. 95-8).
88 There are no wolves in Africa. Dr James Bynon informs me that the Arabic
word Dhfb, dib in Moroccan Arabic, means 'jackal' throughout the whole region,
the Berber equivalent being ushshn. He suggests that the initial w may have been
added because I.B. did not hear the word in isolation.
89 Tadla in Morocco.
90 See n. 15 above.
91 I.e. of the JazQla, the Arabic name for a Berber tribe of the Sous valley.

972
 TAKADDA

Isfcaq of Janata [Djaneh], an excellent man. I also received

hospitality from Jaefar b. Mufcammad al-Massufi. The houses
of Takadda are built of red stone. Its water runs through
copper mines, spoiling its colour and taste. There is no culti-
vation there except for a little wheat, which is eaten by the
merchants and foreigners, which sells at twenty of their mudds
for a mithqal of gold, their mudd being a third of the mudd of
our country. Millet is sold among them at a gold mithqal for
ninety mudds?2
There are many | scorpions, which kill young children who439
have not reached puberty, but only rarely kill men. One day
while I was there a scorpion stung a son of the shaikh Satd b.
eAlI in the morning. He died at once and I attended his
funeral. The inhabitants of Takadda have no occupation ex-
cept trade. Every year they travel to Egypt and import some of
all the fine fabrics and other such things there are in that
country. These people live in ease and luxury, vying with one
another in the number of their male and female slaves. It is
the same with the people of Malll and Iwalatan. They sell
educated females only rarely and at a high price.
Anecdote. When I came to Takadda I wanted to buy an edu-
cated slave woman, but could not find one. Later the qao1! Abu
Ibrahlm sent me one belonging to one of his friends. | 1440
bought her for twenty-five mithqals. Then her (former) owner
regretted it and wanted to revoke the sale. I said: 'If you show
me another like her I will revoke the deal.' He pointed out to
me a slave woman belonging to 'All Aghyul, 93 the MaghribI of
Tadala who had refused to take any of my belongings when
my she-camel collapsed, and had refused a drink of water to
my slave-boy when he was thirsty. I bought her from him, and
she was better than the first slave. I revoked the deal with the
first owner. Later on the MaghribI regretted the sale of the
slave and wanted to revoke it. He begged me to do so but I
refused if only to repay him for his bad behaviour, and he

92 Other MSS read twenty instead of ninety. The mudd was an extremely
variable measure of capacity; surviving mediaeval standards from Morocco are
0.75 of a litre. Others were much greater.
93 Dr Bynon informs me that agftyul is a Berber word and always means a
donkey; 'it would be a perfectly likely Berber nickname for a man - and by no
means necessarily pejorative or indicative of stupidity'.

973
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

nearly went mad or died of vexation. Afterwards I cancelled

the deal.
Account of the copper mine. The copper mine is outside Takadda.
441 They dig it from the ground and bring it to the town where
they smelt it in their houses. This is done by male and female
slaves. When they have smelted the red copper they make it
into rods a span and a half long, some thin and some thick.
The thick rods are sold at four hundred for a gold mithqal, the
thin ones at six or seven hundred the mithqal. These rods are
used as currency. With the thin rods they buy meat and
firewood, with the thick male and female slaves, millet, butter
and wheat. The copper is carried to the city of Kubar94 in
infidel country, to Zaghay95 and to the country of Barnu
[Bornu], which is forty days' journey from Takadda. Its people
are Muslims. They have a king named Idrls, 96 who does not
appear before the people and speaks to them only from be-
442 hind a curtain. From this country come | beautiful slave-girls
and boys and fabrics dyed in saffron. The copper from Takadda
is also taken to Jaujawa, 97 to the country of the Muwartabun98
and elsewhere.
Account of the Sultan of Takadda. While I was there the qac-I
Abu IbrahTm, the preacher Muhammad, the professor Abu
Hafs, and the shaikh Sa'Id b. eAlT went to the Sultan of
Takadda, who is a Berber named Izar," who was one day's
journey away. A dispute had arisen between him and the
TakarkarT, 10° who is also one of the Berber Sultans. These

94 Gobir.
95 The identification of this place is uncertain. Other MSS read Zaghay and
Zagh.ri. It has been assumed to be the Zagha already mentioned (p. 954) and so
to be Diagha (but see n. 40 above), to be the same as Songhay or to be connected
with the Zaghawa people of the central Sahara. Professor Hunwick, in a letter
dated 29 April 1991, advances strong arguments for identifying it with central
Hausaland; he remarks that Dr Murray Last has contended that Katsina was
originally called Zaye or Za'i ('Before Kano, before Katsina' in B. M. Barkindo
(ed.), Kano and Some of her Neitfibours, 1989, pp. 129-30).
96 Sultan of Kanem, 1329-53. At this time Bornu was part of the empire of
Kanem. (Y. Urvoy, Histoire de fEmpire de Bornou, Paris, 1949, p. 55.)
97 Perhaps Kukawa in Bornu.
98 Or MurtibTn. Not identified.
99 'This was unlikely to have been his proper name. It suggests the
Tamashegh word Imuzar 'chief or the roots izariezzerlyezzaren signifying 'first', 'to
come before' (Norris, The Tuaregs, p. 36).
100 T'U T
"*"1 • • • i
1 ne 1 agaraigarai, occupying the mountainous region of Air.

974
 IBN BATTUTA ORDERED TO RETURN

four went out to arrange a peace between the two Sultans. I

wanted to meet him, so I hired a guide and set out towards
him. The aforesaid persons told him of my coming and he
rode to meet me on a horse without a saddle | which is theirs
practice. Instead of a saddle he had a superb red rug. He wore
a cloak, trousers and a turban, all of them blue. His sister's
sons were with him; it is they who will inherit his kingdom.
We rose up when he came and shook hands with him. He
asked about me and my coming, and was told my story. He
lodged me in one of the tents of the Yanapibun, who are like
the wusjdn among us. 101 He sent me a sheep roasted on a spit
and a bowl of cow's milk. His mother's and sister's tent was
near us and they came to visit and greet us. His mother used
to send us milk after the night prayer; that is the time when
they milk the cattle, and they drink then and in the early
morning. They do not eat cereal food and know nothing of it.
I stayed among them for six days and every day he used to
send me two roasted rams, in the morning and in the evening.
He gave me | a she-camel and ten gold mithqals. I parted from 444
him and returned to Takadda.
Account of the august command I received. When I returned to
Takadda a young slave of al-Iiajj Muhammad b. Saeid of
Sijilmasa arrived with an order from our master the Comman-
der of the Faithful, the defender of the faith, who puts his
trust in the lord of the worlds, commanding me to come to his
exalted capital. I kissed it and obeyed instantly. I bought two
riding camels for thirty-seven and a third mithqals, meaning to
travel to Tawat [Tuatj. I took on provisions for seventy nights,
for no grain is found between Takadda and Tawat. Only
meat, curdled milk and butter are to be had; they are bought
with cloth.
I left Takadda on Thursday the eleventh of Sha'ban in the
year | fifty-four102 with a big caravan in which was Ja'far of445
Tawat; he is an excellent man. With us was the jurist Mufram-
mad b. 'Abdallah, the qatfl of Takadda. There were some six
hundred female slaves in the caravan. We reached Kahir in the
101 Dr Bynon informs me that wotfan is the regular Moroccan Arabic plural of
ii$ef 'negro, slave'. It refers to the palace guards, slaves of the Sultan, who were
the nucleus of a standing army, as opposed to the tribal levies.
102 12 September 1353.

975
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

country of the Sultan al-Karkari. 103 It is land rich in pasture.

People buy sheep from the Berbers there and cut their meat
into strips, which they dry. The inhabitants of Tawat take
these to their country. From here we entered a plain where
there was no cultivation and no water for three days' journey.
Then for fifteen days we travelled over a plain without cultiva-
tion but there was water. We reached the place where the road
to Ghat, which leads to Egypt, divides from the road to
Tawat. 104 There are underground springs here. The water
flows over iron; if white cloth is washed in it, it becomes
black.
446 We travelled from there for ten | days and reached the
country of the Hakkar [Hoggar], a Berber clan who wear the
lithdm and who are scoundrels. One of their chiefs met us and
stopped the caravan till they were forced to give him cloth and
other such things. We had arrived in their country in the
month of Ramadan, during which they do not go on raids or
intercept caravans; if their robbers find goods on the road in
Ramadan they do not take them. It is so with all the Berbers
along this road.
We travelled for a month in Hakkar country. It has little
vegetation and is stony. The road is rough. On the Feast of
Breaking the Fast we arrived in the country of Berbers who
wear the lithdm, like these (Hakkar). They gave us news of
our own country. They informed us that the Aulad Kharaj and
Ibn Yaghmur105 had revolted and were at Tasablt in Tawat.
447This alarmed | the people of the caravan. Then we arrived at
Buda106 which is one of the biggest villages of Tawat. The soil
is sand and salt flats. Dates are plentiful, though they are not
good, but the inhabitants prefer them to the dates of Sijilmasa.
There is no cultivation, no butter, and no olive oil; these are
imported from the Maghrib. The people eat dates and locusts;
the latter are plentiful and they store them as they do dates
103 Kahir, in another MS Kahiri, is Air (Ayar, Ahyar); al-Karkari must be the
Takarkari recently mentioned (see n. 100).
104 Azawa or Asiu, where the roads to Tuat and Djanet divide.
The Aulad Kharaj, an Arab tribe whose summer quarters were between
Tlemcen, Oujda and the sea, and who wintered in the desert around Tasablt, an
oasis 60 km north of Adrar. They rebelled against Sultan Abu 'Inan under Ya'qQb
b. Yaghmur and remained in the desert defying his authority.
106 20 km north-west of Adrar.

976
 IBN BATTUTA RETURNS TO FEZ

and feed on them. They go out to collect them before sunrise,

as they do not fly then because of the cold.
We stayed in Buda for some days, then left by caravan and
reached Sijilmasa in the middle of Dhu'l-Qa'da. I left it on the
second of Dhu'l-Hijja. 107 It was a time of intense cold and | a448
great deal of snow had settled on the road. I have seen difficult
roads and much snow in Bukhara, Samarqand, Khurasan, and
the country of the Turks, but I never saw one more difficult
than the Umm Junaiba road. 108 On the night of the Feast of
Sacrifice we reached Dar al-TamaV09 I stayed there for the
Day of Sacrifice, then left.
I arrived at the capital city of Fez, the residence of our
master the Commander of the Faithful, God strengthen him.
I kissed his noble hand and I had the happiness of seeing his
blessed countenance. I have taken shelter in his benevolence
after long travelling. May God Most High reward him for his
profuse favours and abundant benefactions to me, prolong his
days and cause the Muslims to rejoice by the long duration of
his life.
Here ends the book of travels entitled A Gift to those who
contemplate the wonders of cities and the marvels of travelling. Its
composition was completed on the third day of Dhu'l-Iiijja of
the year | seven hundred and fifty-six. 110 Praise be to God and 449
peace to those of his servants whom he has chosen.
Ibn Juzayy remarks: 'This completes the epitome I made
of the composition of the shaikh Abu 'Abdallah Muhammad
b. Baftuta, God ennoble him. It is obvious to anyone of
intelligence that this shaikh is the traveller of the age. If
anyone were to call him "the traveller of this (Muslim)
community" he would not exaggerate. He travelled to the
countries of the world and then chose the capital city of Fez
in which to settle and make his home only because he was
certain that our master, God strengthen him, is the greatest
of kings, who has the most merit, bestows the most favours, has
the most concern for those who visit him, and who bestows

107 29 December 1353.

108 A defile in the Atlas 90 km south-east of Fez. Another MS reads Umm
Hablba.
109 perhaps the pass of Tamelalt between Azrou and Sefrou.
110 13 December 1355.

977
 THE COUNTRY OF THE BLACKS

the fullest protection on those intent on seeking knowledge.

'It is fitting that someone like me should praise God Most
High for the good fortune he accorded me in my first years |
450 setting out to make my home in this capital which this shaikh
chose after travelling for twenty-five years. It is an inestimable
blessing for which sufficient thanks are not possible. May God
Most High extend His help to us in the service of our master,
the Commander of the Faithful, May He cause the shadow of
his protection and his mercy to remain over us. May He
recompense him on behalf of us who are strangers devoted to
him with the best recompense of the beneficent.
'Oh God, since You have exalted him above the kings in the
two merits of knowledge and the faith, and have distinguished
him by forbearance and sound intellect, extend over his king-
dom the ropes of strength and stability. Cause him to know
the benefits of divine help and of sure victory. Preserve the
kingdom in his descendants till the Day of Judgment. Oh
most merciful of the merciful, make him delight in himself,
his children, his kingdom and his subjects. |
451 'God grant His blessing and His peace to our lord, our
master, our prophet Muhammad, the seal of the prophets, the
imam of His messengers. Praise be to God the lord of the
worlds.'
The copying of this was completed in §afar of the year
seven hundred and fifty-seven. 1H God reward him who copied
it.

February 1356.

978
 BIBLIOGRAPHY
This bibliography is in no way an attempt to provide a complete list of works con-
cerned with Ibn Battuta or relevant to his narrative. It is intended merely to give
fuller details of books and articles to which reference is made in the annotations.

Oriental texts and translations

Ay MAD BABA. Nail al-ibtihdj fi tatrtz al-dibdj. Fez, 1317/1899.

BADAUNI, CABD AL-QADIR. Muntakhab al-tawdrikh, vol. I.
Trans. J. S. Ranking. Calcutta, 1898.
IBN BATTUJA. Description de Farchipel d'Asie. Trans. E.
Dulaurier. Journal asiatique, serie IV, t. xii, 1847.
IBN BATTUTA. Voyages d°lbn Batoutah, texte arabe, accompagne
d'une traduction. Ed. and trans. C. Defremery and B. R.
Sanguinetti. Paris, 1874-9. 4 vols.
IBN BATTUTA. Die Reise des Arabers Ibn Batuta durch Indien und
China. Ed. Hans von Mzik. Hamburg, 1911.
IBN BATTUTA. Ibn Battuta, Travels in Asia and Africa, 1325—
1354. Trans. and selected by H. A. R. Gibb. London,
1929.
IBN BATTUTA. Textes et documents relatifs a Fhistoire de FAfrique.
Extraits tires des Voyages d*Ibn Ba(tu(a. Trans. and notes by
R. Mauny, V. Monteil, A. Djenidi, S. Robert, J. Devisse.
Dakar, 1966.
IBN BATTUTA. Ibn Battuta in Black Africa. Ed. Said Hamdun &
Noel King. London, 1975.
IBN AL-AyMAR. Raudat al-nisrin fi daula Bam Mann. Rabat,
1962.'
IBN FARtf ON. AL-dtbdj al-mudhdhahab, Cairo, undated.
IBN ^IAJAR AL-eAsQALANi. Al-durar al-kdmina. Hyderabad,
1929-31. 4 vols.
IBN AL-JAUZI. Kitdb al-mudhish fi al-mufyddardt. (in MS).
IBN KHALDUN. Histoire des Berberes et des dynasties musulmanes
de FAfrique septentrionale. Paris, 1925, 1927. 2 vols.
979
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

IBN AL-KHATIB. Al-ihd(a fi akhbdr Ghamdfa. Cairo, 1319. 2

vols.
IBN TAGHRIBIRDI. Al-manhal al-saft. Summarized translation
in G. Wiet Les Biographies du ManhalSafi, Cairo, 1932.
MAQQARI. The History of the Mohammedan Dynasties in Spain,
Trans. P. de Gayangos. London, 1840, 1843. 2 vols.
MARRAKUSHI. Al-mu'jib fi talkhis. akhbdr al-Magfirib. ed. R.
Dozy. Leyden, 1817 and 1881.
Histoiredes Almohades. (Trans. E. Fagnan). Alger, 1893.
SUBKI. Tabaqdt al-Shdftiya. Cairo, undated. 6 vols.
YAQUT. Mujam al-bulddn. Leipzig, 1866-73. 6 vols.

Books and articles in Western languages

ARIE, RACHEL. L'Espagne musulmane au temps des Nasrides.

Paris, 1973.
BARKINDO, B. M. (ed.) Kano and Some of her Neighbours. Kano,
1989.
BOVILL, E. W. Missions to the Niger Hakluyt Society, Cam-
bridge, 1964-6. 4 vols. (Including Clapperton's narrative
in vol. IV and Denham's in vols II and III.)
BOYLE, J. A. (ed.) The Cambridge History of Iran. Vol. V.
Cambridge, 1968.
BRUNSCHVIG, R. La Berberie orientate sous les Hafsides. Paris,
1946-7. 2 vols.
CAILLE, R. Un Voyage a Tomboctou. Paris, 1850.
CLAPPERTON, H. See BOVILL, E. W.
COOLEY, W. D. The Negroland of the Arabs Examined and Ex­
plained. London, 1841.
COUTO, DIOGO DO Asia. Lisbon, 1778-88. 24 vols.
CRAWFURD, J. A Descriptive Dictionary of the Indian Islands.
London, 1856.
DELAFOSSE, M. 'Le Gana et le Mali et Pemplacement de leurs
capitales', Bulletin du Comite a"etudes historiques et scientifi-
quesdefA.O.F., 1924.
DENHAM, D. See BOVILL, E. W.
DOZY, R. Supplement aux dictionnaires arabes. Leiden, 1881. 2
vols.

980
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

DUNN, Ross E. The Adventures of Ibn Eattuta. London &

Sydney, 1986.
Encyclopedia of Islam. New edition. Leiden, 1954-.
ENTHOVEN, R. E. The Tribes and Castes of Bombay. Bombay,
1920. 3 vols.
FALLON, S. W. A New Hindustani—English Dictionary. Banaras,
1879. 2 vols.
FATIMI, S. Q. Islam comes to Malaysia. Singapore, 1963.
FERRAND, G. Relations de voyages et textes geographiques arabes,
persons et turcs relatifs a TExtreme-Orient. Paris, 1913, 1914.
2 vols.
FORBES, A. 'The Mosque in the Maldive Islands: a Prelimin-
ary Historical Survey', Archipel, 26, 1983.
FREYTAG, G. W. Arabum proverbia. Bonn, 1838 43. 4 vols.
Gazetteer of Iran. US Board of Geographic Names. 2nd edn.
Washington, 1984. 2 vols.
GERNET, J. La Vie quotidienne en Chine a la veille de Finvasion
mongole. Paris, 1959.
HAMANI, D. M. Au Carrefour du Soudan et de la Berberie: le
sultanat de TAyar. 1989.
HILL, A. H. 'The Coming of Islam to North Sumatra', Journal
of Southeast Asian History, 4, 1963.
HILL, D. Islamic Architecture in North Africa. London, 1976.
HISKETT, M. The Development of Islam in West Africa. London
& New York, 1984.
HOLT, P. M. 'The Coronation Oaths of the Nubian Kings',
Sudanic Africa, I, 1990.
HUNWICK, J. O. 'An Andalusian in Mali', Paideuma, XXXVI,
1990.
'The Mid-Fourteenth Century Capital of Mali', Journal of
African History, XIV, ii, 1975.
—Sharfa in Songhay. Oxford, 1985.
KNOX, R. An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon, in the East-
Indies. London, 1681.
KROM, N. J. Hindoe-Javaansche Geschiedenis. 2nd ed., 's Gra-
venhage, 1931.
LANGLOIS, J. D. (ed.) China under Mongol Rule. Princetown,
1981.
LAST, M. 'Before Kano, before Katsina', in BARKINDO Kano
and some of her Neighbours.
981
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

E. 'Le Voyage d'lbn Battuta dans le

royaume de Grenade', Melanges offerts a William Marqais,
Paris, 1950.
LEVTZION, N. Ancient Ghana and Mali. London, 1973.
LHOTE, H. 'Recherches sur Takedda', Bulletin de FInstitut
fondamentaldeFAfrique Noire, XXXIV, no. 3, 1972.
MAJUMDAR, R. G. (ed.) The Delhi Sultanate. Bombay, 1960.
MARQAIS, G. UArchitecture musulmane d* Occident. Paris, 1954.
MAUNY, R. (et. al.) See IBN BATTUTA.
MEEK, C. K. The Northern Tribes of Nigeria. London, 1925. 2
vols.
MELTON, E. Zee- en Land Reizen. Amsterdam, 1681.
MONTEIL, C. Les Empires du Mali. Paris, 1968.
MOULE, A. C. Quinsai with other notes on Marco Polo. Gam-
bridge, 1957.
NORRIS, H. T. 'The Early Islamic Settlement in Gibraltar',
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, XCI, ii, 1961.
The Tuaregs. Warminster, 1975.
PELLIOT, P. Notes on Marco Polo. I. Paris, 1950.
POLO, MARCO. The Book of SerMarco Polo. Trans. Sir H. Yule.
3rd ed. revised by H. Cordier. London, 1921. 2 vols.
PYRARD DE LAVAL, F. The Voyages of Franqois Pyrard of Lava/.
Trans. and ed. by Albert Gray with the assistance of H.
C. P. Bell, London, 1887-90. 2 vols.
ROOD, F. R. People of the Veil. London, 1926.
SEGAL, J. B. A History of the Jews of Cochin. London, 1993.
SIDDIQI, J. M. Aligarh: Snippets from the Past. Aligarh, 1975.
SKEEN, W. Adam's Peak. London, 1870.
SMITH, G. R. and PORTER, V. 'The Rasulids in Dhofar in the
VIIth-VIHth/XIIIth-XIVth Centuries', JRAS, 1988, I.
TIBBETTS, G. R. A Study of the Arabic Texts containing Material
on South-East Asia. Leiden & London, 1979.
University of Ceylon History of Ceylon, Colombo, 1959-73. 3 vols.
URVOY, Y. Histoire de F empire de Bornou. Paris, 1949.
VALENTIJN, F. Francois Valentijn's Description of Ceylon. Trans.
and ed. S. Arasaratnam. Hakluyt Society, London, 1978.
WHEATLEY, P. The Golden Khersonese. Kuala Lumpur, 1961.
YAMAMOTO, T. 'On Tawalisi as described by Ibn Battuta',
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YULB, H *iut fa Way toy H.

Cordier, Hakluyt Society, London, 1913-16, 4 ¥ols*
—and A, C. New by W,
Crooke, London, 1%8.