D̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā

, Geography.

(I) The term d̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā and the Arabs’ conception of geography

The term d̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā (or d̲j̲ig̲h̲rāfiyā , d̲j̲āōg̲h̲rāfiyā , etc.), the title of the
works of Marinos of Tyre (c. 70-130) and Claudius Ptolemy (c.A.D. 90-
168) was translated into Arabic as Ṣūrat al-arḍ which was used by some
Arab geographers as the title of their works. Al-Masʿūdī (d. 345/956)
explained the term as ḳaṭʿ al-arḍ , ‘survey of the Earth’. However, it was
used for the first time in the Rasāʾil Ik̲h̲wān al-Ṣafāʾ in the sense of ‘map
of the world and the climes’. The Arabs did not conceive of geography as
a well-defined and delimited science with a specific connotation and
subject-matter in the modern sense. The Arabic geographical literature
was distributed over a number of disciplines, and separate monographs on
various aspects of geography were produced under such headings as
Kitāb al-Buldān , Ṣūrat al-arḍ, al-Masālik wa ’l-mamālik , ʿIlm al-ṭuruḳ ,
etc. Al-Bīrūnī considered al-Masālik as the science which dealt with
fixing the geographical position of places. Al-Muḳaddasī came nearest to
dealing with most aspects of geography in his work Aḥsan al-taḳāsīm fī
maʿrifat al-aḳālīm . The present use of the term d̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiya for
geography in Arabic is a comparatively modern practice.

(II) Pre-Islamic and Early Islamic Periods

In pre-Islamic times the Arabs’ knowledge of geography was confined to

certain traditional and ancient geographical notions or to place-names of
Arabia and the adjacent lands. The three main sources where these are
preserved are: the Ḳurʾān, ¶ the Prophetic Tradition ( ḥadīt̲ h̲ ) and ancient
Arabic poetry. Many of these notions must have originated from
Babylonia in ancient times or were based on Jewish and Christian
traditions and indigenous Arab sources.

The geographical concepts or information contained in ancient Arabic

poetry reflect the level of understanding of the pre-Islamic Arabs of
geographical phenomena and the limits of their knowledge. The Ḳurʾān
preserves traces of some geographical and cosmographical ideas which
resemble ancient Babylonian, Iranian and Greek concepts and the Jewish
and Christian Biblical traditions. Verses like ‘the heavens and the earth
were joined together before we clove them asunder’ (XXI, 30); ‘God is
He Who created seven Firmaments and of the earth a similar number’
(LXV, 12); ‘God is He who raised the heavens without any pillars’ (XIII,
2); ʿAnd we have made the heavens as a canopy well guarded’ (XXI, 32);
‘He withholds the sky from falling on the earth except by His leave’
(XXII, 65); and verses that describe the earth as being spread out and the
mountains set thereon firm so that it may not shake, all form a picture
which resembles the ancient Babylonian concept of the universe in which
the Earth was a disc-shaped body surrounded by water and then by
another belt of mountains upon which the Firmament rested. There was
water under the Earth as well as above it. Again, concepts like that of ‘the
Sun setting in a spring of murky water’ (XVIII, 86) referring to the
Atlantic, and of the earth’s being flat must have had their origin in Greek
geography. The concept of the two seas, one of sweet water and the other
saline (XXV, 53), referring to the Mediterranean and the Arabian Sea,
and that of al-barzak̲h̲ , ‘the barrier’ between them (a by-form of farsak̲h̲
‘parasang’, from Pahlavi frasang ) were most probably of Iranian origin.
Besides, certain terms in the Ḳurʾān, e.g., burūd̲j̲ (= Gr. Πύρϒος, Latin
burgus ), baladun or baladatun (a Semitic borrowing from the Latin
palatium: Gr. Παλάτιον), ḳarya (> Syriac ḳrīt̲ h̲āʾ , a town or village),
indicate the non-Arab origin of the concepts with which these terms are
associated in the Ḳurʾān.

There are some traditions attributed to ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib (d. 40/660), Ibn
ʿAbbās (d. 66-9/686-8), ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAmr b. al-ʿĀṣ and others, which
deal with cosmogony, geography and other related questions, but it seems
that these traditions which reflect the ancient geographical notions of the
Arabs were concocted in a later period to counteract the scientific
geographical knowledge that was becoming popular among the Arabs of
the period, although they were presented as authentic knowledge by some
geographers in their works. Though scientific knowledge advanced, some
of the traditions exercised deep influence on Arab geographical thought
and cartography, e.g., the tradition according to which the shape of the
land-mass was compared to a big bird whose head was China, right wing
India, left wing al-K̲h̲azar, chest Mecca, Ḥid̲j̲āz, Syria, ʿIrāḳ and Egypt
and tail North Africa (Ibn al-Faḳīh, 3-4) became the basis of the
geographical writings of the Balk̲h̲ī School. It is not unlikely that this
concept had its origin in some ancient Iranian maps observed by the
Arabs.

The political expansion of the Arabs, after the rise of Islam, into Africa
and Asia, afforded them opportunities to collect information and to
observe and record their experiences of the various countries that had
come under their sway or were adjacent to the Arab Empire. Whether
such information was ¶ gathered for military expeditions or for other
purposes, it is very likely that it was also utilized in the topographical
works that were produced during the early ʿAbbāsid period.
(III) The Transmission of Indian, Iranian and Greek Geographical
Knowledge to the Arabs

It was not until the beginning of the ʿAbbāsid rule and the establishment
of Bag̲h̲dād as the capital of the empire that the Arabs began acquainting
themselves with scientific geography in the true sense. The conquest of
Īrān, Egypt and Sind gave the Arabs the opportunity to gain first hand
knowledge of the scientific and cultural achievements of the peoples of
these ancient cradles of civilization, as well as giving them ownership of,
or easy access to their centres of learning, laboratories and observatories.
But the process of acquiring and assimilating foreign knowledge did not
begin until the time of the Caliph Abū D̲j̲aʿfar al-Manṣūr (135-58/753-
75), the founder of Bag̲h̲dād. He took a keen interest in the translation of
scientific works into Arabic, which activity lasted for nearly two hundred
years in the Islamic world. The Barmakid [q.v.] wazīrs also played an
important role in the promotion of scientific activity at the court. Quite
often the translators were themselves eminent scientists whose efforts
enriched the Arabic language with Indian, Iranian and Greek
geographical, astronomical and philosophical knowledge.

Indian Influences. Indian geographical and astronomical knowledge

passed on to the Arabs through the first translation into Arabic of the
Sanskrit treatise Sūrya-siddhānta (not Brahmasphut́asiddhānta as
believed by some scholars) during the reign of al-Manṣūr. The work
showed some earlier Greek influences (see A. B. Keith, History of
Sanskrit literature, 517-21), but once translated into Arabic it became the
main source of the Arabs’ knowledge of Indian astronomy and
geography, and formed the basis of many works that were produced
during this period, e.g., Kitāb al-Zīd̲j̲ by Ibrāhīm b. Ḥabīb al-Fazārī
(wrote after 170/786), al-Sind Hind al-sag̲h̲īr by Muḥammad b. Mūsā al-
K̲h̲wārizmī (d. after 232/847), al-Sind Hind by Ḥabas̲ h̲ b. ʿAbd Allāh al-
Marwazī al-Bag̲h̲dādī (second half of the 3rd/9th century) and others.

Among other Sanskrit works translated into Arabic during this period
were: Āryabhat́īya (Ar.: Ard̲j̲abhad ) by Āryabhat́a of Kusumapura (b.
A.D. 476) who wrote in A.D. 499; then, Khandakhādyaka of
Brahmagupta son of D̲j̲is̲ h̲nu of Bhillamāla (near Multān). He was born in
A.D. 598 and wrote this work in A.D. 665. It was a practical treatise
giving material in a convenient form for astronomical calculations, but
this was based on a lost work of Āryabhat́a, who again agreed with the
Sūryasiddhānta . The Sanskrit literature translated into Arabic belonged
mainly to the Gupta period.
The influence of Indian astronomy on Arab thought was much deeper
than that of Indian geography, and although Greek and Iranian ideas had
a deeper and more lasting effect, Indian geographical concepts and
methods were well known. Indians were compared to the Greeks in their
talent and achievements in the field of geography, but the Greeks were
considered more accomplished in this field (al-Bīrūnī, al-Ḳānūn , 536).

Among the various geographical concepts with which the Arab scientists
became acquainted were: the view of Āryabhat́a that the daily rotation of
the ¶ heavens is only apparent, being caused by the rotation of the earth
on its own axis; that the proportion of water and land on the surface of the
Earth was half and half; that the land-mass, which was compared to a
tortoise, was surrounded by water on all sides, and was shaped like a
dome whose highest point had Mount Meru (an imaginary mountain) on
it directly under the North Pole; the northern hemisphere was the
inhabited part of the Earth and its four limits were D̲j̲amakūt in the East,
Rūm in the West, Lankā (Ceylon) which is the Cupola and Sīdpūr, and
the division of the inhabited part of the Earth into nine parts. The Indians
calculated their longitudes from Ceylon and believed that this prime
meridian passed through Ud̲j̲d̲j̲ayn [q.v.] (Ujjain). The Arabs took over
the idea of Ceylon’s being the Cupola of the Earth, but later believed that
Ud̲j̲d̲j̲ayn was the Cupola, mistakenly thinking that the Indians calculated
longitudes from that point.

Iranian Influences. There is sufficient evidence in Arabic geographical

literature to point to Iranian influences on Arab geography and
cartography, but the actual process of the transmission of Īrān’s
knowledge to the Arabs has not been worked out in detail. J. H. Kramers
correctly points out that during the 9th century Greek influence was
supreme in Arab geography, but from the end of the 9th century the
influence was more from the east than from the west, and it was from Īrān
that these influences mainly came, for most of the authors came from the
Iranian provinces ( Analecta Orientalia , i, 147-8). Ḏj̲undaysābūr was still
a great centre of learning and research and there is little doubt that the
Arabs were acquainted with some of the Pahlavi works on astronomy,
geography, history and other subjects which were extant in some parts of
Irān during this period. Some of these works were translated into Arabic
and formed the basis of the Arabic works on the subject. Al-Masʿūdī
ascribes to Ḥabas̲ h̲ b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Marwazī al-Bag̲h̲dādī an
astronomical treatise Zid̲j̲_ al-S̲h̲āh which was based on the Persian style.
He also recorded a Persian work entitled Kāh-nāma which dealt with the
various grades of kings and formed a part of the larger work entitled Āʾīn-
nāma , ‘Book of Customs’ . Again, he mentions having seen at Iṣṭak̲h̲r in
302/915 a work that dealt with the various sciences of the Iranians, their
histories, monuments, etc. and other information that was not found either
in K̲h̲udāʾī-nāma , Āʾīn-nāma or Kāh-nāma. This work was discovered
among the treasures of the Persian kings and was translated from Persian
into Arabic for His̲ h̲ām b. ʿAbd al-Malik b. Marwān (105-25/724-43). It
is not unlikely that works of this nature formed part of the sources of the
Arabs’ knowledge on the geography and topography of Īrān and on the
limits of the Sāsānian Empire, its administrative divisions and other
details.

Among the various Iranian geographical concepts and traditions followed

by Arab geographers, the concept of the Seven Kis̲ h̲wars ( Haft Iḳlīm )
was the most important. In this system the world was divided into seven
equal geometric circles, each representing a kis̲ h̲war , in such a manner
that the fourth circle was drawn in the centre with the remaining six
around it, and included Īrāns̲ h̲ahr of which the most central district was
al-Sawād. The Arab geographers continued to be influenced by this
system for a long time, and in spite of the view of al-Bīrūnī that it had no
scientific or physical basis and that the Greek division of the Climes was
more ¶ scientific, the Greek division of the world into three or four
continents never appealed to them. The concept of the two main seas,
namely, the Baḥr al-Rūm and the Baḥr Fārs (the Mediterranean and the
Indian Ocean) which entered the land from the Baḥr al-Muḥīṭ (the
Encircling Ocean), one from the north-west, i.e., the Atlantic and the
other from the east, i.e., the Pacific, but were separated by al-Barzak̲h̲
(‘the Barrier’, i.e., the Isthmus of Suez), also dominated Arab geography
and cartography for several centuries. As pointed out by J. H. Kramers,
although it is very probable that the notion rests in the last resort on
Ptolemy, the fact that the Indian Ocean is most often called Baḥr Fārs,
seems to prove that this sea, at least, formed part of the original
geographic sketch of the Persians. As to the origin of this sketch itself we
find ourselves in uncertainty (Analecta Orientalia, i, 153).

Persian traditions deeply influenced Arab maritime literature and

navigation also, as is evident from the use of words of Persian origin in
the nautical vocabulary of the Arabs, e.g., bandar (port), nāk̲h̲udā
(shipmaster), rahmānī (book of nautical instructions), daftar (sailing
instructions), etc. Certain Persian names like k̲h̲ann (rhumb), ḳuṭb al-d̲j̲āh
(pole), etc., also indicate Persian influences on the Arab windrose. Such
examples can be multiplied. Persian influences are apparent in Arab
cartography as well, an indication of which is found in the use of terms of
Persian origin, e.g., ṭaylasān , s̲ h̲ābūra , ḳuwāra , etc., to describe certain
formations of coasts. These terms, originally indicating certain garments,
were used right down to the 7th/13th century. They also point to the
existence of maps in ancient Īrān (J. H. Kramers, op. cit. 148-9). As for
the ‘Indian map which is at al-Ḳawād̲h̲iyān’ (Ibn Ḥawḳal, ed. Kramers, 2)
Kramers pointed out that al-Ḳawād̲h̲iyān must contain here an allusion to
more primitive maps of the Balk̲h̲ī-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī series, because the maps of
Ibn Ḥawḳal are partly in conformity with this series and partly different
(Kramers, op. cit., 155). A correct identification of these maps or their
discovery would certainly help to solve the problem of the origin of the
maps of the Balk̲h̲ī school. Here it may be pointed out that if we read Ibn
Ḥawkạl’s text as ‘the geometrical map at al-Ḳawād̲h̲iyān’ (a town near
Tirmid̲h̲ in Central Asia), then he must have been referring to some map
that was there and was used by geographers as a basis for cartography. It
is quite likely that it was based on the Persian kis̲ h̲war system, for al-
Bīrūnī remarks that the term kis̲ h̲war was derived from ‘the line’ ( al-
k̲h̲aṭṭ ) which really indicated that these divisions were as distinct from
each other as anything that was drawn in lines would be ( Ṣifat , ed.
Togan, 61).

Greek Influences. More positive data are available on how Greek

geographical and astronomical knowledge passed on to the Arabs in the
mediaeval period. The process began with the translations of the works of
Claudius Ptolemy and other Greek astronomers and philosophers into
Arabic either directly or through the medium of Syriac.

Ptolemy’s Geography was translated several times during the ʿAbbāsid

period, but what we possess is the adaptation of Ptolemy’s work by
Muḥammad b. Mūsā al-K̲h̲wārizmī (d. after 232/847) with contemporary
data and knowledge acquired by the Arabs incorporated into it. Ibn
K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih mentions having consulted and translated Ptolemy’s work
(perhaps it was in the original Greek or in Syriac translation) and al-
Masʿūdī also consulted a copy of ¶ the Geography and also the world
map by Ptolemy. It seems that some of these translations had become
corrupt, and foreign material was interpolated into them which did not
belong to the original work, e.g., the copy consulted by Ibn Ḥawḳal (ed.
Kramers, 13). Among other works of Ptolemy translated into Arabic and
utilized by Arab geographers were: Almagest (Ar.: Almad̲j̲isṭī );
Tetrabiblon (Ar.: al-Maḳālāt al-arbaʿa ); Apparitions of fixed stars, etc.
(Ar.: Kitāb al-Anwāʾ ).

Among other works translated into Arabic were: the Geography of

Marinos of Tyre (c. A.D. 70-130) consulted by al-Masʿūdī who also
consulted the world map by Marinos; the Timaeus (Ar.: Ṭaymāʾūs ) of
Plato; the Meteorology (Ar.: al-Āt̲ h̲ār al-ʿulwiyya ), De caelo (Ar.: al-
Samāʾ wa ’l-ʿālam ) and Metaphysics (Ar.: Mā baʿd al-ṭabīʿa ) of
Aristotle.

The works of these writers and of several other Greek astronomers and
philosophers, when rendered into Arabic, provided material in the form of
concepts, theories and results of astronomical observations which
ultimately helped Arab geography to evolve on a scientific basis. Persian
influences were no doubt marked in regional and descriptive geography
as well as in cartography, but Greek influence dominated practically the
whole canvas of Arab geography. Even in fields where it may be said that
there was a kind of competition between Persian and Greek ideas or
methodology, e.g., between the Persian kis̲ h̲war system and the Greek
system of Climes, the Greek were more acceptable and remained popular.
The Greek basis of Arab geography was most prominent in mathematical,
physical, human and bio-geography. The Greek impact had a very lasting
influence, for it remained the basis of Arab geography as late as the 19th
century (traces found in 19th century Persian and even Urdū works on
geography written in India), even though on European minds Ptolemaic
influence had decreased much earlier. It cannot, however, be denied that
throughout this period there was an undercurrent of conflict between the
theoretical concepts of the Greek masters on the one hand and the
practice and observation of the merchants and sailors of this period on the
other. Al-Masʿūdī refers to it in the case of the Ptolemaic theory of the
existence of an unknown land in the southern hemisphere. On the other
hand Ibn Ḥawḳal considered Ptolemy almost infallible. The fact was that
Greek information when transmitted to the Arabs was already outdated by
about five centuries, and so difficulty arose when Arab geographers tried
to incorporate fresh and contemporary information acquired by them into
the Ptolemaic frame-work and to corroborate it with Greek data. The
result was confusion and often misrepresentation of facts in geographical
literature and cartography, as is evident from the works of geographers
like al-Idrīsī.

(IV) The Classical Period (3rd-5th/9th-11th centuries)

(a) The Period of al-Maʾmūn (197-218/813-33):

Over half a century of Arab familiarity with, and study of Indian, Iranian
and Greek geographical science, from the time of the Caliph al-Manṣūr
(136-57/754-74) up to the time of al-Maʾmūn, resulted in completely
revolutionizing Arab geographical thought. Such concepts as that the
Earth was round and not flat, and that it occupied the central position in
the Universe, were introduced to them for the first time properly and
systematically. ¶ Henceforth, the Ḳurʾānic verses dealing with
cosmogony, geography, etc. and the Traditions were utilized only to give
religious sanction to geographical works or to exhort the believers to
study geography and astronomy. Thus, by the beginning of the 3rd/9th
century the real basis was laid for the production of geographical
literature in Arabic and the first positive step in this regard was taken by
the Caliph al-Maʾmūn, who successfully surrounded himself with a band
of scientists and scholars and patronized their academic activities.
Whether al-Maʾmūn’s interest in astronomy and geography was genuine
and academic, or whether it was political is not certain. During his reign,
however, some very important contributions were made towards the
advancement of geography: the measurement of an arc of a meridian was
carried out (the mean result gave 56⅔ Arabic miles as the length of a
degree of longitude, a remarkably accurate value); the astronomical tables
called al-Zīd̲j̲ al-mumtaḥan (The verified tables) were prepared by the
collective efforts of the astronomers; lastly, a World Map called al-Ṣūra
al-Maʾmūniyya was prepared, which was considered superior to the maps
of Ptolemy and Marinos of Tyre by al-Masʿūdī who had consulted and
compared all three ( Tanbīh , ed. De Goeje, 33). It was most probably
based on the Greek system of climes.

(b) The Astronomers and Philosophers:

The Arab astronomers and philosophers made equally important

contributions to mathematical and physical geography through their
observations and theoretical discussions. From the time of the
introduction of Greek philosophy and astronomy in the second half of the
2nd/8th century up to the first half of the 5th/11th century a galaxy of
philosophers and astronomers worked on various problems of
mathematical, astronomical and physical geography. The works of the
Greek scientists had already provided enough basis and material for this.
Thus the results of the experiments, observations and theoretical
discussions of the Arab scientists were recorded in their more general
works on astronomy and philosophy or in monographs on special subjects
like tides, mountains, etc. The contemporary and later writers on general
geography in Arabic often, though not always, reproduced these results in
their works and sometimes discussed them. Some of these writers
reproduced various current theories, Greek or otherwise, about a problem
in the introductory parts of their works. Thus a tradition was established
of writing on mathematical, physical and human geography in the
beginning of any work dealing with geography. This is noticeable, for
example, in the works of Ibn Rusta, al-Yaʿḳūbī, al-Masʿūdī, Ibn Ḥawkạl,
etc.
Among the outstanding Arab philosophers and astronomers whose works
were utilized and theories discussed by Arab geographers were: Yaʿḳūb
b. Isḥāḳ al-Kindī (d. 260/874), to whom two works on geography are
attributed, (1) Rasm al-maʿmūr min al-arḍ and (2) Risāla fi ’l-biḥār wa
’l-madd wa ’l-d̲j̲azr . One of al-Kindī’s pupils, Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b.
al-Ṭayyib al-Sarak̲h̲sī (d. 286/899), is also said to have written two works,
(1) al-Masālik wa ’l-mamālik and (2) Risāla fi ’l-biḥār wa ’l-miyāh wa ’l-
d̲j̲ibāl . Neither the works of al-Kindī nor those of al-Sarak̲h̲sī are extant,
and what we know of their geographical views are from other sources
which used them. It seems that the two authors utilized the works of
Ptolemy and other Greek writers, as ¶ we find in al-Masʿūdī that their
works did contain Ptolemaic information on physical and mathematical
geography and on oceanography. Al-Kindī’s work Rasm al-maʿmūr min
al-arḍ may have been a version of Ptolemy’s Geography as the title of
the work itself suggests; al-Masʿūdī consulted a work of Ptolemy’s
entitled Maskūn al-arḍ and a world map called Ṣūrat maʿmūr al-arḍ (al-
Masʿūdī, Murūd̲j̲ , i, 275-7; Tanbīh , 25, 30, 51).

Among other philosophers and astronomers whose writings served as a

source of information on mathematical and physical geography were: al-
Fazārī (second half of the 2nd/8th century); Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b.
Kat̲ h̲īr al-Farg̲h̲ānī (d. after 247/861) author of al-Fuṣūl al-t̲ h̲alāt̲ h̲īn (al-
Masʿūdī, Murūd̲j̲, iii, 443; Tanbīh, 199) and al-Mudk̲h̲il ilā ʿilm hayʾat al-
aflāk ; Abū Maʿs̲ h̲ar D̲j̲aʿfar b. Muḥammad al-Balk̲h̲ī (d. 273/886), author
of al-Mudk̲h̲il al-kabīr ilā ʿilm al-nud̲j̲ūm ; al-Masʿūdī consulted another
work by him entitled Kitāb al-ulūf fi’l-hayākil wa ’l-bunyān al-ʿaẓīm ;
then Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. Ḏj̲ābir al-Battānī (d. 317/929) and
others. The fourth Risāla of the Rasāʾil Ik̲h̲wān al-Ṣafā deals with
D̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā . Written in about 370/980, it simply deals with elementary
knowledge about mathematical and physical geography based on Greek
geography, since the main purpose of the writers was to guide the reader
to achieve union with God through wisdom.

(c) General Geographical Literature:

By the 3rd/9th century a considerable amount of geographical literature

had been produced in various forms in the Arabic language, and it
appears that the Arabs had at their disposal some Pahlavi works, or
translations thereof, dealing with the Sāsānian Empire, its geography,
topography, postal routes and details essential for administrative
purposes. These works must have become available to those interested in
geography and topography. It is not surprising, therefore, to find that
early writers like Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih, Ḳudāma and others were heads of
postal departments or government secretaries, besides being men of
learning. During the 3rd/9th century, therefore, a number of works were
produced that were given the generic title al-Masālik wa ’l-mamālik . In
all probability the first work bearing this title was that of Ibn
K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih. The first draft of his work was prepared in 231/846 and
the second in 272/885; it became the basis and model for writers on
general geography and was highly praised by almost all geographers who
utilized it. He was the Director of the Post and Intelligence Department
and was a man of learning and erudition. What prompted him to write a
geographical treatise may be explained from his own statement that it was
in fulfilment of the desire of the Caliph, for whom he also translated the
work of Ptolemy (from Greek or Syriac) into Arabic (Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih,
3). However, the desire of the Caliph may itself have arisen from the
practical needs of the government. We find that Ḳudāma b. D̲j̲aʿfar al-
Kātib considered the ‘science of roads’ ( ʿilm al-ṭuruḳ ) not only useful
for general guidance in the Dīwān , but also essential for the Caliph who
might need it for his travels or for despatching his armies (185).

The geographical works produced during the 3rd/9th and 4th/10th

centuries may be divided into two broad categories: (1) works dealing
with the world as a whole but treating the ʿAbbāsid Empire ( Mamlakat
al-Islām ) in greater detail. They attempted to give all such secular
information as could not ¶ find a place in the general Islamic literature,
and hence this category is called ‘the secular geographical literature of
the period’. The writers described the topography and the road-system of
the ʿAbbāsid Empire and covered mathematical, astronomical, physical,
human and economic geography. Among the representatives of this class
of geographers were: Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih, al-Yaʿḳūbī, Ibn al-Faḳīh,
Ḳudāma and al-Masʿūdī. Since ʿIrāḳ was the most important centre of
geographical learning at this time and many of the geographers belonged
to it, we may for the sake of convenience use the term ʿIrāḳī School for
them. Within this School, however, two groups of writers may be
discerned: those who present the material following the four directions,
viz ., north, south, east and west, and tend to consider Bag̲h̲dād as the
centre of the world, and those who arrange it according to various Iḳlīms
(regions) and for the most part treat Mecca as the centre. (2) To the
second category of works belong the writings of al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, Ibn Ḥawḳal
and al-Muḳaddasī, for whom the term Balk̲h̲ī School has been used, as
they followed Abū Zayd al-Balk̲h̲ī (see below). They confined their
accounts to the world of Islam, describing each province as a separate
Iḳlīm , and hardly touching upon non-Islamic lands except the frontier
regions.
(i) The ʿIrāḳī School. The works of Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih, al-Yaʿḳūbī and
al-Masʿūdī are distinguished from the writings of other geographers of
this School by two special features: first, they follow the Iranian kis̲ h̲war
system, and second, they equate ʿIrāḳ with Īrāns̲ h̲ahr and begin their
descriptions with it, thus placing ʿIrāḳ in a central position in Arab
regional and descriptive geography. According to al-Bīrūnī the Seven
kis̲ h̲wars were represented by seven equal circles. The central kis̲ h̲war
was Īrāns̲ h̲ahr which included K̲h̲urāsān, Fārs, D̲j̲ibāl and ʿIrāḳ. He
considered that these divisions were arbitrary and had been made
primarily for political and administrative reasons. In ancient times the
great kings lived in Īrāns̲ h̲ahr, and it was necessary for them to live in the
central zone so that they would be equidistant from other kingdoms and
therefore find it easy to deal with matters. Such a division had no relation
either to the physical systems or to astronomical laws, but was based on
political changes or ethnological differences ( Ṣifa , ed. Togan, 5, 60-62).
With the foundation of Bag̲h̲dād as the capital of the ʿAbbāsid Empire,
ʿIrāḳ naturally occupied a central and politically important position in the
world of Islam. Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih equated ʿIrāḳ with Īrāns̲ h̲ahr and the
district of al-Sawād which was called dil-i Īrāns̲ h̲ahr in ancient times
occupied the central position in his system of geography, and he begins
his account with its description. Similarly, al-Yaʿḳūbī considered ʿIrāḳ as
the centre of the world and ‘the navel of the earth’ (surrat al-arḍ), but for
him Bag̲h̲dād was the centre of ʿIrāḳ, for it was not only the greatest city
of the world unparalleled in its glory, but it was also the seat of
government of the Banū Hās̲ h̲im. Because it occupied a central position
in the world, ʿIrāḳ had a moderate climate, its inhabitants were handsome
and intelligent and possessed high morals. But in his system of geography
Bag̲h̲dād is grouped with Sāmarrā, and the description begins with these
two towns. A similar note of the superiority of ʿIrāḳ is struck by the
historian and geographer al-Masʿūdī, who thought of Bag̲h̲dād as the best
city in the world (Tanbīh, 34; cf. Ibn al-Faḳīh, 195 ff.)

As against these writers, Ḳudāma, Ibn Rusta and ¶ Ibn al-Faḳīh display
no enthusiasm for ʿIrāḳ or Īrāns̲ h̲ahr. In their system Mecca and Arabia
are given precedence. In Ḳudāma Mecca is given absolute precedence
and all roads leading to Mecca are described before an account of roads
leading out of Bag̲h̲dād is given. He did give importance to ʿIrāḳ, but as
the capital province of the Mamlakat al-Islām . Thus he considered it
important, but only from a political and administrative point of view. In
his system of geography, therefore, there is a slight shift of emphasis
from the Iranian concept to what might be termed an ‘Islamic approach’
to geography. A similar tendency is also noticeable in Ibn Rusta
(beginning of 4th/10th century) who departed completely from the
Iranian traditions and assigned to Mecca and Medina the foremost place
in his arrangement of geographical material. In his description of the
Seven Iḳlīms he prefers to describe them according to the Greek pattern
and not according to the kis̲ h̲war system. In the geographical work of Ibn
al-Faḳīh also, the description of Mecca takes precedence, but a
considerable portion of the work is devoted to Fārs, K̲h̲urāsān, etc. and
the Iḳlīms are described according to the kis̲ h̲war system.

An important feature of the works of Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih, al-Yaʿḳūbī and

Ḳudāma is that the material in them is arranged and described following
the four directions, namely, east, west, north and south according to the
division of the world into four quarters. Such a method of description
must have had its origin in some Iranian geographical tradition, and the
Arab geographers must have had some pattern before them to copy.
According to al-Masʿūdī the Persians and the Nabataeans divided the
inhabited part of the world into four parts, viz ., K̲h̲urāsān (east), Bāk̲h̲tar
(north), K̲h̲urbarān (west) and Nīmrūz (south) ( Tanbīh , 31; cf. al-
Yaʿḳūbī, 268). However, Ḳudāma points out the arbitrariness of such a
division. For him the terms east, west, north and south had only a relative
value. In Ibn Rusta and Ibn al-Faḳīh, the arrangement is by regions.

Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih, who may be called the father of geography, laid

down the pattern and style for writing geography in the Arabic language.
But, as J. H. Kramers pointed out, he was not an inventor of this style or
pattern. He must have had some pattern or sample of an earlier work on
the subject before him. There is a great likelihood that an Arabic
translation of some earlier Pahlavi work on ancient Īrān was accessible to
him. His work covers not only the Mamlakat al-Islām , but describes its
frontiers and kingdoms and the peoples bordering on them. He was well
acquainted with Ptolemy’s work as is evident from his description of the
limits of inhabited parts of the world and from the description of the
Greek conception of the continents, namely, Arūfā , Lūbya , Ityūfiyā and
Isḳūtiyā .

Aḥmad b. Abī Yaʿḳūb b. Wāḍiḥ al-Kātib al-Yaʿḳūbī (d. 284/897) claims

to have travelled a great deal. He emphasized the fact of having obtained
information from the inhabitants of the regions concerned, and of having
verified it from trustworthy persons (232-3). His object in writing the
book was to describe the routes leading to the frontiers of the Empire and
the territories adjacent to them. It is for this reason that he dealt in a
separate monograph with the history and geography of Rūm (the
Byzantine Empire), and devoted another work to the conquest of Ifrīḳiya
(North Africa). Al-Yaʿḳūbī’s work deals mainly with topography and ¶
itineraries, and his arrangement of the material is similar to that of Ibn
K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih.

Ḳudāma b. D̲j̲aʿfar al-Kātib (4th/10th century) devoted the eleventh

chapter of his work Kitāb al-k̲h̲arād̲j̲ wa ṣarʿat al-kitāb to a description of
the postal stations and routes of the ʿAbbāsid Empire. The main objective
of his work was to describe the Mamlakat al-Islām and its frontiers,
especially the frontiers with the Byzantine empire (Rūm) which he
considered the greatest enemy of Islam (252). In his geography the
‘Islamic approach’ is perceptible, but a political attitude like the defence
of the frontiers is also discernible. His work also covers descriptions of
peoples and kingdoms surrounding the Mamlaka . He deals with general
and physical geography and seems to have borrowed information on
regional and descriptive geography from the Greek sources.

Ibn Rusta’s work (beginning of 4th/10th century) entitled al-Aʿlāḳ al-

nafīsa resembles that of Ḳudāma in that it describes Mecca and Medina in
the very beginning of the portion dealing with regional geography. The
main purpose of the work, however, seems to have been to provide
general information about the world as a whole, and hence one finds in it,
besides a description of the Islamic lands, descriptions on a regional basis
of several countries lying outside the limits of Islam. He dealt with
mathematical geography in a systematic and exhaustive way and
collected varied theories and opinions about various problems (23-4). He
presents material on general and physical geography and describes the
Iḳlīms after the Greeks. Considering the variety of information
accumulated in it, his work may be described as a ‘small encyclopaedia
of historical and geographical knowledge’.

Like Ibn Rusta, Ibn al-Faḳīh al-Hamad̲h̲ānī also arranged his

geographical material on a regional basis in his Kitāb al-Buldān (written
c. 290/903). The description of Mecca takes precedence over other
places, and the general arrangement of the subject-matter resembles that
of al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī and Ibn Ḥawḳal. He incorporated the account of the
merchant Sulaymān on India and China, but the special feature of his
work is that, along with trustworthy and authentic information, it records
long pieces of verse, various traditions and information of a legendary
character. The work is poor in the treatment of general and mathematical
geography.

Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn al-Masʿūdī (d. 345/956), the celebrated

historian, combined the qualities of an experienced traveller with those of
a geographer of high distinction. Unfortunately his own account of his
travels ( Kitāb al-Ḳaḍāyā wa ’l-tad̲j̲ārib ) is not extant, but an
approximate idea of his travels can be formed from his extant works,
namely, Murūd̲j̲ al-d̲h̲ahab wa maʿādin al-d̲j̲awhar and al-Tanbīh wa ’l-
is̲ h̲rāf (the work entitled Ak̲h̲bār al-zamān , etc. ed. ʿAbd Allāh al-Ṣāwī,
Cairo 1938, and a MS of the Maulana Azad Library, Muslim University,
ʿAlīgaŕh (Qutbuddin Collection, MS No. 36/1) entitled Kitāb ʿAd̲j̲āʾib al-
dunyā (in the colophon Kitāb al-ʿAd̲j̲āʾib ) are both wrongly attributed to
al-Masʿūdī and have nothing to do with his great work Kitāb Ak̲h̲bār al-
zamān which is lost). Al-Masʿūdī regarded geography as a part of history,
which explains the fact that his works deal with geography as an
introduction to history. He drew upon the earlier geographical writings in
Arabic as well as upon contemporary travel accounts and maritime
literature. This he reinforced by the information collected by himself
during his travels or from people whom he met. He does not give any
systematic topographical account ¶ of the ʿAbbāsid Empire or deal with
routes of the kingdom or postal stations, but he presents an excellent
survey of contemporary Arab knowledge on mathematical and physical
geography. However, al-Masʿūdī’s main contribution was in the field of
human and general geography. He advanced geographical science by
challenging certain theories and concepts of Arab geographers which he
found baseless in the light of his own experience and observation. He did
not hesitate even to question the age-old theories of the Greek masters
like Ptolemy, e.g., the existence of land in the southern hemisphere. In the
field of human and physical geography he emphasized the influence of
the environment and other geographical factors on the physique and
character of animals, plants and human beings. Al-Masʿūdī was also
influenced by Iranian geographical traditions, e.g., the Seven kis̲ h̲war
system, considering ʿIrāḳ as the central and the best iḳlīm in the world
and Bag̲h̲dād as the best city, etc.

An outstanding geographer of this period whose influence on the

development of Arab geography was as varied and deep as that of Ibn
K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih was the Sāmānid wazīr Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b.
Aḥmad al-D̲j̲ayhānī (earlier part of the 4th/10th century). Unfortunately,
his work Kitāb al-Masālik wa ’l-mamālik (the Kābul MS has nothing to
do with the great work of D̲j̲ayhānī, see V. Minorsky, A false Jayhānī , in
BSOAS, xiii, 1949-50, 89-96) has not come down to us; but it is quite
likely that al-D̲j̲ayhanī used the original text of Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih’s
Kitāb al-Masālik. Being in the privileged position of a wazīr and writing
in Buk̲h̲ārā he ‘could extend the field of his investigation much deeper
into central Asia and the Far East than was possible for his Arab
contemporaries’ (Minorsky, Marvazī , etc. 6-7, London 1942). He
collected first-hand information from different sources, hence the
importance of his work. A large number of later Arab geographers
utilized al-D̲j̲ayhānī’s work which, in the opinion of al-Masʿūdī, was
‘interesting because of its novel information and interesting stories’.

The anonymous Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , written in Persian in 372/982 is one of

the earliest works in Persian on world geography. The author utilized
numerous earlier Arabic authorities on the subject and he had
undoubtedly a copy of the work of al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī before him. There is a
tendency in the work towards completeness and numerical exactitude.
Besides, the author is independent of other geographers in his
geographical generalizations and terminology. The originality of the
author lies in his conception of the division of the inhabited world into
‘parts of the world’ and separate ‘countries’ (see Barthold, Preface to
Ḥudūd al-ʿālam, 21-33). The work appeared in an English translation
with an excellent commentary by V. Minorsky (London 1937), one of the
most exhaustive ever written on any Persian or Arabic geographical work
in modern times.

(ii) The Balk̲h̲ī School. To the second main category of writers on general
geography belonged al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, Ibn Ḥawḳal and al-Muḳaddasī as well as
Abū Zayd Aḥmad b. Sahl al-Balk̲h̲ī (d. 322/934) after whom this School
is named. Al-Balk̲h̲ī wrote his geographical work Ṣuwar al-aḳālīm
(primarily a commentary on maps) in 308/920 or a little later. He spent
some eight years in ʿIrāḳ and had studied under al-Kindī. He had
travelled widely before his return to his native place and had acquired a
high reputation for knowledge and erudition. However, ¶ probably in the
later part of his life he held orthodox views and wrote several treatises
which were highly appreciated in orthodox circles. Although the text of
al-Balk̲h̲ī’s geographical work has not yet been separately established,
and the MSS, at one time attributed to al-Balk̲h̲ī, have now been proved
to be of al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, the view of De Goeje still seems to hold good that the
work of al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī represents a second and greatly enlarged edition of al-
Balk̲h̲ī’s work, compiled between 318/930 and 321/933, in al-Balk̲h̲ī’s
lifetime.

The geographers of the Balk̲h̲ī School gave a positive Islamic colouring

to Arab geography. In addition to restricting themselves mainly to Islamic
lands, they laid emphasis on such geographical concepts as found
concurrence in the Ḳurʾān or were based on the traditions and sayings of
the Companions of the Prophet and others, e.g., they compared the land-
mass with a big bird (see above). This was in conformity with a tradition
attributed to ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAmr b. al-ʿĀṣ (Ibn al-Faḳīh, 3-4). Again, the
land-mass, round in shape, was encompassed by the ‘Encircling Ocean’
like a neck-ring, and from this Ocean the two ‘gulfs’ (the Mediterranean
and the Indian Ocean) flowed inwards without joining each other, being
separated by al-Barzak̲h̲ [q.v.], the ‘barrier’ at al-Ḳulzum, a concept
found in the Ḳurʾān (see above). Again, unlike some geographers of the
ʿIrāḳī School, the geographers of the Balk̲h̲ī School assigned to Arabia
the central place in the world, for it had Mecca and the Kaʿba in it. These
new trends in the methodology and treatment of the subject-matter
became the dominant feature of the geographers of this School, and must
in all probability have been a culmination of the early process wherein
Mecca was given precedence over ʿIrāḳ by one group of geographers.
The prime object of these later geographers was to describe exclusively
the bilād al-Islām which they divided into twenty iḳlīms, except that they
discussed the non-Islamic lands in general in their introductory notes. The
basis of the division of these ‘provinces’ was neither the Iranian kis̲ h̲war
system nor the Greek system of Climes. It was territorial and purely
physical. This was a positive advancement on previous methods and in a
way ‘modern’. As pointed out by Ibn Ḥawḳal (2-3) he did not follow the
pattern of the ‘seven iḳlīms’ (of the map at al-Ḳawād̲h̲iyān, see above),
for although it was correct, it was full of confusion, with some
overlapping of the boundaries of the ‘provinces’. Hence he drew a
separate map for each section describing the position of each ‘province’,
its boundaries and other geographical information. An important
contribution made by these geographers was that they systematized and
enlarged the scope of geography by including in it new topics with a view
to making it more useful and interesting, for they believed that a much
wider range of people were interested in it, like the kings, the people of
muruwwa and the leading sections of all classes (Ibn Ḥawḳal, 3). In
cartography, besides drawing the regional maps on a more scientific
basis, they may be said to have introduced the element of perspective.
They drew a round map of the world showing the various ‘regions’ of the
bilād al-Islām and other non-Islamic ‘regions’ of the world. The aim was
to bring them in proper perspective and to show the relative position and
size of each. But since it did not represent the true size and shape (round,
square or triangular) of the respective iḳlīms, they mapped each in a
magnified form. Their drawing these on a purely physical basis was ¶
probably the first experiment of its kind in Arab cartography. The maps
of al-Iṣtạk̲h̲rī and Ibn Ḥawḳal are, in this respect, superior to those of al-
Idrīsī, who divided the seven latitudinal Climes into ten longitudinal
sections each and drew a map for each section separately with the result
that these sectional maps do not represent geographical units but
geometrical divisions. Al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, Ibn Ḥawḳal and al-Muḳaddasī present
for the first time the concept of a country as defined in geographical
terms, and even go so far as to delimit the boundaries of each, just as they
define the boundaries of the four main kingdoms of the world.

Abū Isḥāḳ Ibrāhīm b. Muḥammad al-Fārisī al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī (first half of the

4th/10th century) seems to have been mainly responsible for spreading
the ideas of the Balk̲h̲ī School. Little is known of his life, but he travelled
a good deal and incorporated the experiences of his travels in his work al-
Masālik wa ’l-mamālik (a new edition of this work has appeared recently,
ed. by M. D̲j̲ābir ʿAbd al-ʿĀl al-Ḥīnī, Cairo 1961). There is little doubt
that the work was based on that of Abū Zayd al-Balk̲h̲ī. Al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī’s
work served as an authentic source of information for the geographers of
this School. It was translated into Persian and became the basis of many
Persian works on geography.

Abu ’l-Ḳāsim Muḥammad b. Ḥawḳal, a native of Bag̲h̲dād, completed his

geography entitled Kitāb Ṣūrat al-arḍ (2nd ed. J. H. Kramers, Leiden
1938) in c. 366/977. From his childhood, Ibn Ḥawḳal was interested in
geography and had travelled widely between 331/943 and 357/968. He
was so devoted to geography that the works of al-Ḏj̲ayhānī, Ibn
K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih and Ḳudāma never parted from him during his travels.
About the first two he says that they so engaged him that he was unable
to devote any attention either to the other useful sciences or to the
Traditions. However, what prompted him to write his work was that he
found none of the existing works on the subject satisfactory. He claims to
have improved the work of al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī whom he had met. However, the
claims of Ibn Ḥawḳal may not be accepted unequivocally, for the
similarity between the works of the two geographers itself suggests that
Ibn Ḥawḳal must have been considerably indebted to al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī. There is
little doubt, however, that he ranks among the most outstanding
geographers of the period, for in cartography he shows independence and
individuality and does not follow others slavishly. Besides, he
incorporated new information based on his travels or acquired from
hearsay. He remained an authentic source of information for the
succeeding geographers for several centuries to come.

Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. Aḥmad al-Mukạddasī (d. 390/1000), the

author of Aḥsan al-taḳāsīm fī maʿrifat al-aḳālīm was a very original and
scientific geographer of his time. He rightly claims to have put Arab
geography on a new foundation and given it a new meaning and wider
scope. Since he considered the subject useful to many sections of society,
as also to the followers of various vocations, he widened its scope,
including in it a variety of subjects ranging from physical features of the
iḳlīm (region) under discussion to mines, languages and races of the
peoples, customs and habits, religions and sects, character, weights and
measures and the territorial divisions, routes and distances. He believed
that it was not a science that was acquired through conjecture ( ḳiyās ),
but through direct observation and first-hand information. Hence he laid
his main emphasis on what ¶ was actually observed and was reasonable.
From the earlier writers he borrowed what was most essential ‘without
stealing from them’. Thus, according to the nature of the sources of
information, his work may be divided into three parts: what he observed
himself; what he heard from trustworthy people; and what he found in
written works on the subject. Al-Muḳaddasī is one of the few Arab
geographers who discusses geographical terminology and specific
connotations of certain phrases and words used, besides giving a synopsis
and an index of the iḳlīms , districts, etc., in the introduction of his work
for the benefit of those who want to get an idea of the contents quickly or
wish to use it as a traveller’s guide. Unlike Iṣṭak̲h̲rī and Ibn Ḥawḳal, al-
Muḳaddasī divided the Mamlakat al-Islām into fourteen iḳlīms (seven
ʿarab and seven ʿad̲j̲am ) perhaps to conform to the belief that there were
seven climes north of the Equator and seven others to its south, an idea
attributed to Hermes, the legendary figure known to the Arabs as an
ancient philosopher of Egypt. In this respect he differed from Abū Zayd
al-Balk̲h̲ī and al-D̲j̲ayhānī, whom he however considered Imāms (here
authorities). An important feature of his work is that like a mufassir he
discusses at length certain questions relating to general geography, e.g.,
the number of the seas, etc., in order to bring them into conformity with
the Ḳurʾānic verses relating to them.

(d) Trade and exploration: the maritime literature:

An important aspect of the development of Arabic geographical literature

of this period was the production of the maritime literature and travel
accounts, which enriched the Arabs’ knowledge of regional and
descriptive geography. This became possible firstly, because of the
political expansion of the Muslims and the religious affinity felt by them
towards one another irrespective of nationality or race, and secondly,
because of the phenomenal increase in the commercial activities of the
Arab merchants. Incentive to travel and exploration was provided by
several factors, viz ., pilgrimage to Mecca, missionary zeal, deputation as
envoys, official expeditions, trade and commerce, and, last but not least,
the mariners’ profession.

From very ancient times the Arabs played the rôle of intermediaries in
trade between the East (India, China, etc.) on the one hand and the West
(Egypt, Syria, Rome, etc.) on the other. But with the foundation of
Bag̲h̲dād as the capital of the ʿAbbāsid Empire and the development of
the ports of Baṣra and Sīrāf, the actual and personal participation of the
Arabs now extended as far as China in the east and Sofala on the east
coast of Africa. They had learned and mastered the art of navigation from
the Persians, and by the 3rd/9th century Arab navigators had become
quite familiar with the monsoon and trade winds, and their boats sailed
not only along the coasts but direct to India from Arabia. They had
become intimate with the various stretches of the sea between the Persian
Gulf and the Sea of China, which they divided into the Seven Seas giving
each a specific name. Again, they sailed from Aden to East Africa as far
south as Sofala and freely sailed on the Red Sea, the Mediterranean, the
Black Sea and the Caspian and also on a number of navigable rivers
including the Nile and the Indus. Although their boats were small as
compared to those of the Chinese, and the Indian Ocean was infested with
whales, they performed long and ¶ hazardous voyages with courage and
fortitude. They used sea-charts ( rahmānīs and dafātir ). Al-Masʿūdī (
Murūd̲j̲ , i, 233-4) records names of certain captains of boats whom he
knew and expert sailors of the Indian Ocean; similarly, al-Muḳaddasī (10-
11) gives the name of an expert merchant-sailor whom he consulted on
the question of the shape of the Indian Ocean. Aḥmad b. Mād̲j̲id ([q.v.],
see also below) speaks of an old rahmānī composed by Muḥammad b.
S̲h̲ādān, Sahl b. Abbān and Layt̲ h̲ b. Kahlān (lived in the later part of the
3rd/9th century), but he considered them much below the standard (see
Hourani, Arab seafaring, 107-8). Since none of these charts is extant, it is
not possible to make a correct assessment of the contribution made by
these early Arab navigators to nautical geography.

With the development of Arab navigation, Arab trade also expanded.

With a strong political power in the Middle East and a developing
economy at home, the Arabs acquired considerable importance as traders
in the East. The sphere of their trade not only widened, but became more
intensive. They even traded by barter with the primitive tribes of the
Andaman and Nicobar Islands, whose languages they did not understand.
Arab trade with China declined from about the end of the 3rd/9th century,
for it is said that in the peasant rebellion under Huang Ch’ao (A.D. 878)
large numbers of foreigners were massacred in China. From this time
onwards Arab boats went only as far as Kala, a port on the western coast
of the Malay Peninsula, no longer existing.

The Arabs’ urge to explore new lands was mainly prompted by a desire
for trade and rarely for the sake of exploration. Although some instances
of early Arab adventures and exploration are recorded, many of these
seem to have been ‘wonder tales’ (e.g., the interpreter Sallām’s account
of his trip to the wall of Gog and Magog under the orders of the Caliph
Wāt̲ h̲iḳ (227-32/842-7), see Minorsky, Ḥudūd al-ʿālam , 225). The story
of a certain young man of Cordova (Spain) who sailed with a group of
young friends on the Atlantic Ocean and then returned after some time,
laden with booty, may have had some historical truth in it (al-Masʿūdī, i,
258-9). On the whole the Arabs of this period did not make any
substantial contribution to or improve upon the knowledge acquired from
the Greeks. There is no doubt however that in regard to certain regions,
viz ., North and East Africa, West Asia, Middle Asia, India and a few
other countries, their information was much more authentic and intimate.

The fact that the Arabs did not explore the regions unknown to them,
even those of which they had a theoretical knowledge, may be explained
by several factors: wherever the trade incentive was satisfied, they did not
proceed beyond that point; secondly, certain notions or preconceived
ideas continuously dominated their thought and dissuaded them from
taking a bold step, e.g., the Atlantic was a Sea of Darkness and a Muddy
Spring ( al-ʿayn al-ḥamiʾa ). For the same reason they did not sail further
south along the east coast of Africa, for they believed that there were high
tidal waves and sea commotion there, although al-Bīrūnī, on the basis of
certain evidence discovered in the 3rd/9th century, namely, the discovery
in the Mediterranean of planks from boats of the Indian Ocean (see
above), had conceived that the Indian Ocean was connected with the
Atlantic by means of narrow passages south of the sources of the Nile (
Ṣifa , 3-4). Lastly, the fear of encountering aboriginal tribes and cannibals
¶ of the East Indies must have prevented the Arabs from sailing further
east.

Among the travel accounts of this period that have survived, one of the
earliest is that attributed to the merchant Sulaymān, who performed
several voyages to India and China and described his impressions of the
lands and the peoples in the travelogue Ak̲h̲bār al-Ṣin wa ’l-Hind
(235/850). The work is a testimony of the keen but academic interest
taken by Arab merchants in conveying to the Arabic-reading peoples of
the time unique and interesting information about the distant lands of the
East. This account was first published in 302/916 by Abū Zayd al-Ḥasan
of Sīrāf along with other accounts collected and verified by him in a work
entitled Silsilat al-tawārīk̲h̲ . Abū Zayd was apparently a well-to-do
person, and although he had not himself travelled, he was keenly
interested in gathering information from travellers and merchants and in
recording it. He met al-Masʿūdī at least twice and exchanged much
information with him. Al-Masʿūdī, who represented the finest spirit of
exploration of his time, had travelled very widely and sailed on many
seas including the Caspian and the Mediterranean. He must have
discussed with Abū Zayd the discovery near Crete of the planks of a boat
belonging to the Arabian Sea. This was a unique phenomenon for it was
believed that the Arabian Sea had no connexion with the Mediterranean.
Al-Masʿūdī came to the conclusion that the only possibility was that these
planks may have flowed towards the East into the Eastern Sea (the
Pacific) and then northwards and finally, through the k̲h̲alīd̲j̲ (an
imaginary channel flowing down from the northern Encircling Ocean into
the Black Sea) into the Mediterranean (Murūd̲j̲, i, 365-6). The fact that
they both recorded this unique discovery is evidence of their concern
about geographical problems. It also shows that interest in geography was
dynamic during this period, and had not become static as in the later
period.

An interesting writer of this period was Buzurg b. S̲h̲ahriyār, the captain

of Rāmhurmuz (299-399/912-1009) who compiled a book of maritime
tales, entitled Kitāb ʿAd̲j̲āʾib al-Hind in about 342/953. The book relates a
number of very amusing and very strange stories concerning the
adventures of the sailors in the Islands of the East Indies and other parts
of the Indian Ocean. These were apparently composed for the general
reader, and though mostly fantastic, they cannot be completely brushed
aside as untrue and ignored in any serious study of Arab geography and
exploration. It seems that during this period there was a great demand for
wonderful and amusing tales, which fact is borne out by the existence of
several MSS in Arabic dealing with ʿad̲j̲āʾib literature.

This period was on the whole marked by a spirit of enquiry and

investigation and exploration among the Arabs. But the maritime
literature, most of which seems to have perished, posed itself against the
theoretical knowledge derived from the Greek and other sources. Hence
at times there was a contradiction between theory and practice, and this
was the fundamental problem with which the Arab geographers and
travellers were faced. It was this conflict between theory and practice that
finally determined the course of the development of Arab geography in
the later period. When the ‘practicalists’ gave way to the theoreticians,
the decline of Arab geography became certain. Why the word of the
sailor, the traveller and the merchant was not ¶ given due credence is
difficult to explain, but a large amount of maritime literature must have
perished through either neglect or animosity.

(e) Al-Bīrūnī and his contemporaries:

The 5th/11th century may be taken as the apogee of the progress of Arab
geography. The geographical knowledge of the Arabs, both as derived
from the Greeks and others and as advanced by themselves through
research, observation and travel, had, by this period, reached a very high
level of development. Besides, geographical literature had acquired a
special place in Arabic literature, and various forms and methods of
presenting geographical material had been standardized and adopted. The
importance of al-Bīrūnī’s contribution to Arab geography is two-fold:
firstly, he presented a critical summary of the total geographical
knowledge up to his own time, and since he was as well-versed in Greek,
Indian and Iranian contributions to geography and in that of the Arabs, he
made a comparative study of the subject. He pointed out that the Greeks
were more accomplished than the Indians, thereby implying that the
methods and techniques of the former should be adopted. But he was not
dogmatic, and held some important views that were not in conformity
with Greek ideas. Secondly, as an astronomer he not only calculated the
geographical positions of several towns, but measured the length of a
degree of latitude, thus performing one of the three important geodetic
operations in the history of Arab astronomy. He made some remarkable
theoretical advances in general, physical and human geography. On the
basis of the above-mentioned discovery in the Mediterranean of the
planks of an Arabian Sea boat a hundred years earlier, he conceived the
theoretical possibility of the existence of channels connecting the Indian
Ocean with the Atlantic, south of the Mountains of the Moon and the
Sources of the Nile. But these were difficult to cross because of high tides
and strong winds. He argued that just as towards the east, the Indian
Ocean had penetrated the northern continent (Asia) and had opened up
channels, similarly, to balance them, the continent has penetrated the
Indian Ocean towards the west; the sea there is connected through
channels with the Atlantic. Thus, although theoretically he laid down the
possibility of circumnavigating the South African coast, in practice it was
never accomplished by the Muslims. The idea, however, persisted until
the time of the arrival of the Portuguese, when it was hinted by al-
Nahrwālī that the Portuguese might have taken this route. Al-Bīrūnī
conceived that the land-mass was surrounded by water, that the centre of
‘Earth’s weight’ shifted and caused physical changes on its surface, e.g.,
fertile lands turned barren, water turned into land and vice versa. He
described very clearly various concepts and the limits of the inhabited
parts of the earth of his time, for which he seems to have had recourse to
some contemporary sources which were not available to the earlier
geographers. He made an original contribution to regional geography by
describing India in detail.
Among the astronomers of the 5th/11th century one who deserves
mention was Ibn Yūnus, Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (d.
399/1009). While al-Bīrūnī was working in India and other places, Ibn
Yūnus made valuable observations in the observatory on the Mt. al-
Muḳaṭṭam in Egypt under the patronage of the Fāṭimid caliphs al-ʿAzīz
and al-Ḥakīm. The results of his observations ¶ recorded in the al-Zīd̲j̲ al-
kabīr al-Ḥākimī became an important source of up-to-date astronomical
and geographical knowledge for the scientists of the Islamic East.

Among the geographers and travellers contemporary to al-Bīrūnī there

was the Ismāʿīlī poet-traveller Nāṣir-i K̲h̲usraw (d. 452/1060 or
453/1061) whose travel account entitled Safar-nāma written in Persian
covers the author’s personal experiences in and descriptions of Mecca
and Egypt.

Abū ʿUbayd ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al-Azīz al-Bakrī (d. 487/1094) was the
best representative of lexicography of the period in as far as place-names
were concerned. His geographical dictionary Muʿd̲j̲am mā ‘staʿd̲j̲am min
asmāʾ al-bilād wa ’l-mawāḍiʿ is an excellent literary-cum-geographical
work. It discusses the orthography of place-names of the Arabian
peninsula mainly, furnishing literary evidence from Arabic literature,
ancient Arabian poetry, Ḥadīt̲ h̲ , ancient traditions, etc. His second
geographical treatise Kitāb al-masālik wa ’l-mamālik has not survived in
its entirety. Al-Bakrī was, however, more a litterateur than a geographer
[see abū ʿubayd al-bakrī ].

(V) The period of consolidation

(6th/12th-10th/16th centuries)

From the 6th/12th to the 10th/16th century Arab geography displayed

continuous signs of decline. The process was chequered and with some
exceptions like the works of al-Idrīsī and Abu ’l-Fidāʾ the general
standard of works produced was low compared to those of the earlier
period. The scientific and critical attitude towards the subject and
emphasis on authenticity of information that was the mark of the earlier
writers gave place to mere recapitulations and résumés of the traditional
and theoretical knowledge found in the works of earlier writers. This was,
in a way, the period of consolidation of geographical knowledge, and the
literature may be divided into eight broad categories:

(a) World geographical accounts:

The tradition of describing the world as a whole as practised by the
geographers of the classical period continued to be followed by some
geographers of this period, but works dealing exclusively with the world
of Islam had become rare, for the ʿAbbāsid Empire had itself
disintegrated. The pattern of description and arrangement was also
different from the earlier works. There was a tendency towards
rapprochement between astronomical and descriptive geography in these
works, and Greek influence was still prominent in some works, while
Persian influence had comparatively diminished probably because of the
production of geographical literature in Persian as well. But geographical
activity had expanded and places like Syria, Sicily and Spain had become
important centres of geographical learning, and some very important
works were produced there.

Among the important works on world geography and astronomy

produced during this period we may mention Muntahā al-idrāk fī taḳsīm
al-aflāk by ¶ Muḥammad b. Aḥmad al-K̲h̲araḳī (d. 533/1138-9); Kitāb al-
Ḏj̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā by Muḥammad b. Abū Bakr al-Zuhrī of Granada (lived
towards 531/1137); Nuzhat al-mus̲ h̲tāḳ fi ’k̲h̲tirāḳ al-āfāḳ by al-S̲h̲arīf al-
Idrīsī (d. 56/1166); Kitāb al-Ḏj̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā fi ’l-aḳālīm al-sabʿa by Ibn
Saʿīd (d. 672/1274); and Taḳwīm al-buldān by Abu ’l-Fidā (d. 731/1331).

Al-Zuhrī’s work was based on the Greek system of iḳlīms and represented
the trend of rapprochement between astronomical and descriptive
geography. The work of al-Idrīsī, which also represents this tendency, is a
fine example of Arab-Norman cooperation in geographical activities. It
was produced at Palermo under the patronage of the Norman king Roger
II. Al-Idrīsī, who was a prince, and belonged to the Ḥammūdid dynasty,
was neither a renowned traveller nor a trained geographer before he
joined the court of Roger. The aim of Roger in calling him to his court
seems to have been to utilize his personality for his own political
objectives. There is little doubt, however, that Roger was interested in
geography and he was able to collect a team of astronomers and
geographers in his court. As a result of their efforts, for the first time in
the history of Arab cartography, seventy regional maps based on the
Ptolemaic system of climes were drawn, and a large silver map of the
world constructed. The total geographical information acquired from
contemporary as well as earlier Greek or Arab sources was classified
according to the relevant sections each of which formed a description of
one of these maps. The work was an important contribution to physical
and descriptive geography. The work of Ibn Saʿīd was based on the
clime-system. It also gives the latitudes and longitudes of many places
which facilitates their reconstruction into a map. By this time Syria had
become an important centre of geographical activities. Abu ’l-Fidāʾ, the
Syrian prince, historian and geographer, completed his important
compendium on world geography in 721/1321. The work gives latitudes
and longitudes of places and treats the subject-matter on a regional basis.
It is arranged in a systematic way and covers descriptive, astronomical
and human geography. The author seems to have utilized some
contemporary sources, for we find some new information which is not
available in earlier works.

(b) Cosmological works:

During this period several works were produced which dealt not only
with geography but also with cosmology, cosmogony, astrology and such
other topics. The main purpose of these works seems to have been to
present in a consolidated and systematic form world knowledge for the
benefit of the average reader. No doubt the authors utilized earlier Arabic
sources, but on the whole the material is presented uncritically, and there
is hardly any question of investigation or research, and the zeal of enquiry
is totally lacking. The tendency to produce such works was mainly due to
the decline in education and learning which affected the progress of
geographical knowledge.

The following are some of the works that belong to this category: Tuḥfat
al-albāb (or al-aḥbāb ) wa nuk̲h̲bat al-ʿad̲j̲āʾib by Abū Ḥāmid al-
G̲h̲arnāṭī (d. 565/1169-70); ʿAd̲j̲āʾib al-buldān and Āt̲ h̲ār al-bilād by al-
Ḳazwīnī (d. 682/1283); Nuk̲h̲bat al-dahr fī ʿad̲j̲āʾib al-barr wa ’l-baḥr by
al-Dimas̲ h̲ḳī (d. 727/1327); K̲h̲arīdat al-ʿad̲j̲āʾib wa farīdat al-g̲h̲arāʾib
by Ibn al-Wardī (d. 861/1457).

(c) The ziyārāt literature:

A special feature of this period was that a number of works dealing with
the towns and places of religious significance or places of pilgrimage
were produced. These were not purely descriptive or topographical
works. They dealt with the holy spots of Islam, tombs of saints, the takyas
of the ṣūfīs and ribāts along with educational institutions ( madrasas )
specializing in various schools of the S̲h̲arīʿa and other such topics. One
finds in them detailed accounts of place-names in various towns like
Mecca, Damascus, etc. On the whole such works were meant to be
religious guides for pilgrims and devotees, and represent the period of
religious reaction in Islam. Among the representative works of this type
of literature are: Is̲ h̲ārāt ilā maʿrifat al-ziyārāt by al-Harawī (d.
611/1214); al-Dāris fī tāʾrīk̲h̲ al-madāris by ʿAbd al-Ḳādir Muḥammad
al-Nuʿaymī (d. 648/1520); in the Maulana Azad Library, ʿAlīgaŕh
Muslim University, there exists a MS (S̲h̲ērwānī Collection, MS No.
27/34) which, in all probability, is an abridgment of al-Nuʿaymī’s original
work, written 50 years after his death.

(d) Muʿd̲j̲am literature or Geographical dictionaries:

The traditions of geographical studies developed in Syria bore many

fruitful results. Besides the Compendium of Abu ’l-Fidāʾ and the ziyārāt
literature, Yāḳūt al-Ḥamawī (d. 626/1229) produced one of the most
useful works in Arabic geographical literature, namely, Muʿd̲j̲am al-
buldān . Completed in 621/1224, this geographical dictionary of place-
names, which includes other historical and sociological data, was in
keeping with the literary and scientific traditions of the earlier period, and
represents the consummation of geographical knowledge of the time. As
a reference book it is indispensible even to-day for the student of Arab
historical geography. The fact that Yāḳūt crowned the work with an
introduction on Arab geographical theories and concepts and physical and
mathematical geography shows the depth of knowledge of the author.
The work also represents that period of Arab geographical development
when scholars thought in terms of compiling geographical dictionaries,
which would not have been possible without the vast amount of
geographical literature that had already come into existence by this time
and without the geographical tradition that was present in Syria. Another
important work of Yāḳūt is the Kitāb al-Mus̲ h̲tarik waḍʿan wa’l-
muk̲h̲talif ṣaḳʿan , composed in 623/1226.

(e) Travel accounts:

During this period the Arabs’ knowledge of regional and descriptive

geography was considerably enriched by the production of travel
literature in Arabic on a large scale. Besides the usual incentives for
travel like the pilgrimage to Mecca or missionary zeal, the extension of
Muslim political and religious influences, especially in the East, had
opened up for Muslims new vistas of travel and more opportunities for
earning a livelihood.

Among the outstanding travel accounts may be included the work of al-
Māzinī (d. 564/1169); the Riḥla of Ibn D̲j̲ubayr (d. 614/1217); Taʾrīk̲h̲ al-
Mustanṣir (written in c. 627/1230) by Ibn Mud̲j̲āwir; then the Riḥlas of
al-Nabātī (d. 636/1239), al-ʿAbdārī (d. 688/1289), al-Ṭayyibī (698/1299)
and al-Tīd̲j̲ānī (708/1308) and others. Whereas these accounts are of great
importance for the Middle East, ¶ North Africa and parts of Europe, for
they furnish contemporary and often important information, the work of
Ibn Baṭṭūṭa [q.v.] (d. 779/1377) entitled Tuḥfat al-nuẓẓār remains the
most important mediaeval travel account in Arabic for the lands of India,
South-East Asia and other countries of Asia and North Africa.

(f) Maritime literature:

During the period under consideration Arab maritime activities were

confined to the Mediterranean and the Arabian Seas. In the
Mediterranean the Arab navies, using the term in a broader sense, could
never really become all-powerful. They were always busy in sea-wars
with the Christian navies and sometimes as many as a hundred men-of-
war were employed in the forays. Again, although the Arab navigators
were quite familiar with the Mediterranean, sailing on the Atlantic was
still dreaded, and there is only one instance of Arab adventure, namely,
that of Ibn Fāṭima (648/1250). From the account of his voyage preserved
in Ibn Saʿīd it appears that he had reached as far as White mountain
(identified with Cape Branco) along the West African coast. On the
whole it is difficult to assess the amount of the contribution made by the
Arabs of this Sea to nautical geography, for very little is known of their
accounts. But with the rise of the Ottoman power in Asia Minor, the
Ottoman Navy ultimately became very powerful in the Mediterranean
(see VI below).

In the Indian Ocean, however, the Arab navigators maintained their

importance until the arrival of the Portuguese. It was S̲h̲ihāb al-Dīn
Aḥmad b. Mād̲j̲id (the date of his birth or death is not known) who
piloted the boat of Vasco da Gama from Malindi on the east coast of
Africa to Calicut in India in 1498. This incident indeed marks the turning
point in the history of Arab navigation and trade in the East. The advent
of the Portuguese had an adverse effect on the trade and commerce of the
Arabs. Their maritime strength was destroyed and their trade
systematically ruined by the Portuguese.

Ibn Mād̲j̲id, who spent more than fifty years of his life on the high seas,
may be considered as one of the greatest Arab navigators of all times. He
wrote thirty nautical texts and was one of the most important Arab writers
on oceanography, navigation, etc. His contributions bring him in line with
the leading scientists of the period. His most important contribution is the
work Kitāb al-Fawāʾid fī uṣūl ilm al-baḥr wa ’l-ḳawāʿid .

Sulaymān b. Aḥmad al-Mahrī, a younger contemporary of Ibn Mād̲j̲id,

was another important navigator of this period. He was also author of five
nautical works written in the first half of the 10th/16th century. Among
these may be mentioned of special importance: al-ʿUmda al-mahriyya fī
ḍabṭ al-ʿulūm al-baḥriyya compiled in 917/1511-2 and Kitāb S̲h̲arḥ tuḥfat
al-fuḥūl fī tamhīd al-uṣūl .

The works of Ibn Mād̲j̲id and Sulaymān al-Mahrī represent the height of
the Arabs’ knowledge of nautical geography. These navigators used
excellent sea-charts, which are supposed to have had the lines of the
meridian and parallels drawn on them. They also used many fine
instruments and made full use of astronomical knowledge for navigation.
There is little doubt that their knowledge of the seas was considerably
advanced, especially of the Indian Ocean, for in their works they describe
in details the coastlines, routes, etc. of the countries they ¶ visited. They
were familiar with the numerous islands of the East Indies.

(g) Astronomical literature:

During this period some very important works were produced on

astronomy, and one of the most outstanding astronomers of this period
was the Tīmūrid prince-mathematician Ulug̲h̲ Beg (d. 853/1449). But
with the death of Ulug̲h̲ Beg Muslim astronomical literature may be said
to have come to an end, for this was the last scientific effort on the part of
a Muslim prince, before the period of decline in Islamic society set in, to
revise the data of Ptolemy and to perform independent astronomical
observations. The results of Ulug̲h̲ Beg’s observations in which his
collaborators also participated were included in the Zīd̲j̲-i d̲j̲adīd-i Sulṭāni
.

(h) Regional geographical literature:

Between the 7th/13th and the 10th/16th centuries a large amount of

geographical literature, both in Arabic and Persian, came into existence
on a regional or ‘national’ basis. Although no outstanding contributions
were made by the geographers of this period, regional geographical
knowledge was enriched by the efforts of several historians and
geographers. Geographical traditions of the classical period were kept up,
but there was no originality in thought or practice. In astronomical,
physical or human geography no substantial advances were made. The
production of literature on regional geography during this period was
closely connected with the extension of Islam and Muslim political power
in the East, and due to the attention paid by Muslim potentates to
historiography and geography mainly for political purposes.

In ʿIrāḳ and Mesopotamia, the old centre of geographical activity, little

was produced in geographical literature; Meārat̲ h̲ Ḳuds̲ h̲ē by Bar
Hebraeus (d. 685/1286) showed much influence of Islamic tradition and
has a semi-circular world map. In Egypt and Syria the k̲h̲iṭaṭ -literature
was produced under the Ayyūbids and the Mamlūks. Interest in the
ʿad̲j̲āʾib literature and ancient Egypt from the time of the Ayyūbids
resulted in the production of and collection of some fantastic accounts
and stories about ancient Egyptian kings (!) and other tales of common
interest. However, some new and fresh information on the Muslim states
of the East, India and other countries, was also incorporated in these
accounts. Authors who wrote on such subjects were Ibrāhīm b. Waṣīf
S̲h̲āh (wrote in 605/1209); Nuwayrī (d. 629/1332); Maḳrīzī (d. 845/1441-
2); Ibn Faḍl Allāh al-ʿUmarī (d. 749/1348); al-Ḳalḳas̲ h̲andī (d. 821/1418)
and others. In North Africa, al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī al-Marrākus̲ h̲ī wrote D̲j̲āmiʿ-
al-mabādī wa ’l-g̲h̲āyāt which gives latitudes and longitudes partly
compiled by the author. Ibn K̲h̲aldūn’s Muḳaddima contains a chapter on
geography, representing the tradition of some Arab historians of
describing the world as a prelude to history.

In Īrān, Central Asia and India some historical works in Persian dealt
with regional and descriptive geography, and some monographs on world
geography were also produced. The geographical works were mainly
based on earlier Arabic authorities; additional contemporary information
was included in general histories and accounts of conquests. Among the
important works we may mention: Ibn al-Balk̲h̲ī, Fārs-nāma , written in
the beginning of the 6th/12th century; Ḥamdallāh al-Mustawfī (d.
740/1340), Nuzhat al-ḳulūb ; Muḥammad b. Nad̲j̲īb Bakrān ¶ (wrote for
the K̲h̲wārizm-s̲ h̲āh Muḥammad, 596-617/1200-20), Ḏj̲ihān-nāma , which
contains some ‘interesting information on the geography of Transoxania’;
ʿAbd al-Razzāḳ al-Samarḳandī (d. 887/1482), Maṭlaʿ al-saʿdayn ; Amīn
Aḥmad Rāzī, Haft iḳlīm , written in 1002/1594, a biographical work, but
contains much valuable geographical information.

Bibliography

Arabic geographical literature is too vast to allow any brief survey here.
Hence only a select bibliography is given below:

1. Texts, translations and commentaries: Abū Dulaf Misʿar b. al-

Muhalhil, al-Risāla al-t̲ h̲āniya, ed. V. Minorsky, Cairo 1955

al-Bīrūnī, Kitāb al-Ḳānūn al-Masʿūdī, published by the Dāʾirat al-

Maʿārif, Ḥaydarābād (India), 2 vols., 1955

idem, Bīrūnī’s picture of the world (Ṣifat al-maʿmūra ʿalā al-Bīrūnī), ed.
A. Zeki Velidi Togan, Memoir ASI, liii, New Delhi 1941 (the work
contains texts pertaining to geography selected from al-Bīrūnī’s: 1. al-
Ḳānūn al-Masʿūdī, 2. Taḥdīd nihāyāt al-amākin li-taṣḥiḥ masāfāt al-
masākin, 3. al-Ḏj̲amāhir fī maʿrifat al-d̲j̲awāhir, and 4. al-Ṣaydana)

Ḥamdallāh Mustawfī, Nuzhat al-ḳulūb, ed. Muḥammad Dabīr Siyāg̲h̲ī,

Tehrān 1958

al-Hamdānī, Kitāb Ṣifat Ḏj̲azīrat al-ʿArab, ed. Muḥammad b. Balhīd al-

Nad̲j̲dī, Cairo 1953

al-Harawī, ʿAlī b. Abī Bakr, al-Is̲ h̲ārāt ilā maʿrifat al-ziyārāt, ed. and
French transl. J. Sourdel-Thomine, Damascus 1953-7

Ḥudūd al-ʿālam

Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (Eng. tr. H. A. R. Gibb, i- , Cambridge 1958-)

Ibn Faḍlān, Risāla, second edition of the translation and commentary by

A. P. Kovalevsky 1955 (transl. Canard, in AIEO Alger, xvi, 1958)

Ibn Ḥawḳal

Ibn K̲h̲aldūn-Rosenthal

Ibn Mād̲j̲id, Three unknown nautical instructions on the Indian Ocean,

published by T. A. Shumovsky, Moscow 1957

al-Idrīsī, Polska i kraje sasiedni w świetle"Ksiegi Rogera”, geografa

arabskiego z XII w. al-Idrīsīʾego, cześć i, Kraków, 1945

cześć ii, Warsaw 1954

al-Idrīsī, India and the neighbouring territories in the Kitāb Nuzhat al-
mus̲ h̲tāḳ fi ’k̲h̲tirāḳ al-āfāḳ of al-S̲h̲arīf al-Idrīsī, tr. and commentary by S.
Maqbul Ahmad, Leiden 1960

al-Idrīsī, India and the neighbouring territories as described by the Sharīf

al-Idrīsī, ʿAlīgaŕh 1954

al-Iṣṭak̲h̲rī, al-Masālik wa ’l-mamālik, ed. M. D̲j̲ābir ʿAbd al-ʿĀl al-Ḥīnī,

Cairo 1961

T. Lewicki, Zrodla arabskie de dziejow stowianszczyzny, i, Wroclaw,

Cracow 1956
Muḥammad b. Nad̲j̲īb Bakrān, Ḏj̲ihān-nāma, reproduced with translation
by Y. Bors̲ h̲čevsky 1960

al-Nuʿaymī, ʿAbd al-Ḳādir, al-Dāris fī taʾrīk̲h̲ al-madāris, 2 vols.,

Damascus 1948-51

Marwazī, S̲h̲araf al-Zamān Ṭāhir Marvazī on China, the Turks and India,
text, tr. and commentary by V. Minorsky, London 1942

Ak̲h̲bār al-Ṣīn wa ’l-Hind, Relation de la Chine et de l’Inde, rédigée en

851, text, French tr. and Notes by Jean Sauvaget, Paris 1948

Yāḳūt, The Introductory chapters of Yāqūt’s Muʿjam al-buldān, tr. and

annotated by Wadie Jwaideh, Leiden 1959

R. Blachère and H. Darmaun, Extraits des principaux géographes arabes

du moyen âge 2, Paris 1957.

2. General Works: Nafis Ahmad, Muslim contribution to geography,

Lahore 1947

Barthold, Turkestan

G. F. Hourani, Arab seafaring, Princeton 1951

Hādī Hasan, A history of Persian navigation, London 1928

G. H. T. Kimble, Geography in the middle ages, London 1938

J. H. Kramers, Geography and Commerce in The legacy of Islam, ed. T.

Arnold and A. Guillaume, London 1943

¶ Analecta Orientalia, posthumous writings and selected minor works of

J. H. Kramers, Leiden 1954

I. Y. Kračkovskiy, Arabskay̲a̲ geografičeskay̲a̲ literatura (vol. iv of his

collected works), Moscow 1957

Al-Masʿūdī commemoration volume, ed. S. Maqbul Ahmad and A.

Rahman, ʿAlīgaŕh 1960

S. Muzaffar Ali, Arab geography, ʿAlīgaŕh 1960 (being the tr. of Section
II of M. Reinaud’s Introduction générale à la géographie des Orientaux).
3. Articles: Ziauddin Alavi, Physical geography of the Arabs in the Xth
Century A.D., in Indian Geographical Journal, xxii/2, Madras 1947

idem, Arab geography in the 9th and 10th centuries A.D., in Muslim
University Journal, ʿAlīgaŕh 1948

Leo Bagrow, The Vasco Gama’s Pilot, in Studi Colombiani, Genoa 1951

S. Q. Fāṭimī, In quest of Kalah, in Journal Southeast Asian History i/2,

September 1960

V. Minorsky, A False Jayhānī, in BSOAS, xiii, 1949-50, 89-96

S. Maqbul Ahmad, Al-Masʿūdī’s contribution to mediaeval Arab

geography, in IC, xxvii/2, 1953

IC, xxviii/1, 1954

idem. Travels of Abu ’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn al-Masʿūdī, in IC,

xxviii/4, 1954

C. Schoy, Geography of the Muslims of the Middle Ages, in Geographical

Review (American Geographical Society), xiv, 1924, 257-69. Other
articles in Pearson, pp. 269-79

idem, Supplement 1956-60, pp. 82-5.

(S. Maqbul Ahmad)

VI. The Ottoman geographers

The Ottoman Turks do not seem to have begun to write geographical

works until the middle of the 9th/14th century. The first of these were
small cosmographies in the style of Books of Marvels , which treat of the
wonders of Creation. The best known of these works is probably the
“Well-preserved Pearl” ( Dürr-i meknūn ) by Yazi̊ d̲j̲i̊ -og̲h̲lu Aḥmed
Bīd̲j̲ān (d. ca. 860/1456) [q.v.], the brother of the early Ottoman poet
Yazi̊ d̲j̲i̊ -og̲h̲lu Meḥemmed (died 855/1451. The same Aḥmed Bīd̲j̲ān was
also the first to make a translation of extracts from an Arabic
cosmographical work, the ʿAd̲j̲āʾib al-mak̲h̲lūḳāt of Ḳazwīnī (1203-
1283), under the same title, in which the stress likewise is less upon
scientific knowledge than upon the wonders of Creation (see Rieu, Catal .
of Turkish Mss . in the Brit. Mus ., 106 ff.).
Ḳazwīnī’s ʿAd̲j̲āʾib al-mak̲h̲lūḳāt was translated several times into
Turkish (Brockelmann, S I, 882, indicates four Turkish translations of the
work). Likewise under the same title there were in circulation Turkish
translations of Ibn al-Wardī’s (d. 1457) K̲h̲arīdat al-ʿad̲j̲āʾib (indicated in
Beiträge zur historischen Geographie .... vornehmlich des Orients , ed.
Hans Mžik, Festband Eugen Oberhummer , Leipzig and Vienna 1929, 86
ff.), among them one with some contemporary additions by a man of the
early Ottoman period called ʿAlī b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (see my articles Der
Bericht des arabischen Geographen Ibn al-Wardī über Konstantinopel in
Festband Eugen Oberhummer, 84-91, and Ein altosmanischer Bericht
über das vorosmanische Konstantinopel in AION, N.S., i, 1940, 181-9).
Further, after Sipāhīzāde Meḥemmed b. ʿAlī (d. 997/1588) had produced
a new Arabic edition of Abu ’l-Fidā’s Taḳwīm al-buldān under the title
Awḍaḥ al-masālik ilā maʿrifat al-buldān wa’l-mamālik with the material
arranged in alphabetical order and supplemented (Brockelmann, II, 46),
he translated extracts of the work into Turkish under the same title
(Brockelmann, S II, 44).

One of the last of the translations from earlier geographical works is the
“Views of the Worlds” ( Menāẓir al-ʿawālim ) by Meḥmed b. ʿÖmer (not
ʿOt̲ h̲mān), b. Bāyezīd al-ʿĀs̲ h̲i̊ ḳ (b. 964/1555, date of death unknown; the
book was completed 1006/1598). It consists of two parts, of which the
first treats the “world above”, that is, heaven, its inhabitants and the
celestial bodies, and, in appendix, a part of the “world below”, that is, hell
and its inhabitants. Apart from astronomy, which indeed is only
summarily included, this section consists almost exclusively of theology
and mythology. But this first part is actually only an introduction. The
bulk of the work is contained in the second part, which describes the
“world below”, that is, the earth and its inhabitants. It contains first a
universal geography, that is, a little general knowledge of the earth,
followed by separate descriptions arranged in the mediaeval manner
according to natural objects: oceans, islands, swamps and lakes, rivers,
springs, warm springs, mountains and finally, comprising the main
section of the descriptive geography, cities. In this section all of the
geographical material is arranged according to the seven climates of
Ptolemy, the “actual climates” ( aḳālīm-i ḥaḳiḳiyye ). Within this
framework the localities represented are arranged according to the 28
“traditional climates” ( aḳālīm-i ʿurfiyye ) or regions, a principle which
ʿĀs̲ h̲i̊ ḳ had borrowed from the work of Abu ’l-Fidāʾ, with result that
some of the cities treated, according to their location, appear in more than
one of the aḳālīm-i ḥaḳīḳiyye , the applications of the two principles thus
overlapping. Under each heading ʿĀs̲ h̲i̊ ḳ indicates in order the reports of
his authorities translated into Turkish, of the mediaeval Arabic and
Persian writers such as Ibn K̲h̲urradād̲h̲bih, Ibn al-D̲j̲awzī, Yāḳūt,
Ḳazwīnī, Ḥamdullāh Mustawfī and Ibn al-Wardī, each with a precise
indication of the source. ʿĀs̲ h̲i̊ ḳ supplements these with his own reports,
especially for Anatolia, Rumelia and Hungary, also with precise
indication that this particular information derived from the “writer” (
rāḳim al-ḥurūf ), with the date of his visit to the city in question, thus
affording a chronological sequence of his travels.

The geography is followed by a universal descriptive natural science, that

is, the solid, liquid and gaseous minerals, scents, metals, plants, animals
and man. The work in its totality is a broadly sketched compendium of
traditional geography and natural science.

Belonging in a wider sense to the translations of geographical literature is

the manual of astronomy and mathematics written in Persian by ʿAlī
Ḳus̲ h̲d̲j̲i (d. 879/1474), formerly director of Ulug̲h̲ Beg’s observatory in
Samarḳand and later the court astronomer of Meḥemmed II, which was
several times translated into Turkish (see ZDMG, lxxvii, 1923, 40 note 2).
To this category also belongs the “China Book” ( Ḵh̲itāy-nāma ) written
originally in Persian by Sayyid ʿAlī Akbar K̲h̲itāʾī in 1516, in which the
author describes his journey to China in 912-4/1506-8 and his stay of
three years there, and which he dedicated to Selīm I. Under Murād III,
probably in 990/1582, it was translated into Turkish (see P. Kahle in AO,
xii, 91 ff, and Opera Minora 322-3).

In the fields of marine geography and navigation the Ottoman Turks

produced original works. In this respect special mention should to made
of the work of Pīrī Muḥyi ’l-Dīn Reʾīs (d. 962/1554), a nephew of the
famous naval hero Kemāl Reʾīs who knew every corner of the
Mediterranean. In 919/1513 he produced a map of the world in two parts,
of which only the ¶ western part has been preserved, which he presented
to Sultan Selīm I in Cairo (923/1517). For that portion of his work
treating the west Pīrī Reʾīs used as sources maps containing the
Portuguese discoveries up to 1508, as well as a map, since lost,
containing the discoveries made by Christopher Columbus during his
third voyage (1498). He had got the latter from a Spanish sailor who had
gone with Columbus to America three times and who in 1501 at Valencia
had been made a Turkish prisoner by Pīrī Reʾīs’s uncle Kemāl Reʾīs (see
P. Kahle, Die verschollene Columbus-Karte vom Jahre 1498 in einer
türkischen Weltkarte von 1513, Berlin-Leipzig 1933; idem, A lost map of
Columbus, in Opera Minora, Leiden 1956, 247-65; Ibrahim Hakki, Eski
Harıtalar , Istanbul 1936; Afet, Un Amiral Géographe turc du XVI e
siècle , Piri Reїs , auteur de la plus ancienne carte de l’Amérique in
Belleten , i (1937), 333-49; Sadi Selen, Die Nord-Amerika-Karte des Piri
Reїs (1528), ibid. 519-23).

Pīrī Reʾīs then wrote a nautical handbook of the Mediterranean, the

Baḥriyye , containing 129 chapters each provided with a map in which he
gives an exact description of the Mediterranean and all its parts. His
models are Italian portulans and other navigational handbooks, the major
part of which have disappeared. He first dedicated the work to Sultan
Selīm I in 927/1521. After the latter’s death he prepared a second edition
with many additional maps, a modified text, and a poetical introduction
of some 1200 verses in Turkish on the lore of the sea and the sailor,
which he presented in 932/1525-26 to Sultan Süleymān by means of the
Grand Vizier Ibrāhīm Pas̲ h̲a (see P. Kahle, Piri Reʾīs und seine Baḥrīye in
Beiträge zur historischen Geographie ..., Festband E. Oberhummer ,
Leipzig-Vienna 1929, 60-76; idem, Baḥriyya , das türkische
Segelhandbuch für das Mittelländische Meer vom Jahre 1521, the first
part of an unfinished edition, Berlin-Leipzig 1926; the complete work in
facsimile, Kitabi Bahriye , Istanbul 1935).

A similar work of marine geography and navigation on the Indian Ocean

was written in 961/1554 by Seyyidī ʿAlī Reʾīs b. Ḥüseyn, known as
Kātib-i Rūmī (died 970/1562), entitled “The Ocean” ( al-Muḥiṭ ). ʿAlī
Reʾīs made use of the experience of South Arabian sailors who had
served as guides for Vasco de Gama on his voyage to Calicut, and also
translated parts of Suleymān al-Mahrī’s al-ʿUmda al-Mahriyya into
Turkish in his work (see W. Tomaschek and M. Bittner, Die
topographischen Kapitel des indischen Seespiegels Mohit , Vienna 1897;
for the Arabic precursors see Gabriel Ferrand, Relations de Voyages et
textes géographiques ..., ii, Paris 1914).

Yet another work of marine geography from a later period is the “Book of
the Black and White Seas” ( Kitāb Baḥr al-aswad wa ’l-abyaḍ ) written
by Seyyid Nūḥ during the reign of Meḥemmed IV (see F. Babinger,
Seyyid Nūḥ and his Turkish sailing handbook in Imago Mundi , xii
(1955), 180-2).

A kind of terrestrial counterpart to these works of marine geography is

the “Collection of Stations” ( Med̲j̲mūʿ-i menāzil ), an illustrated book by
Naṣūḥ al-Maṭrāḳī (dates unknown) in which he describes briefly and
depicts separately the stages of Sultan Süleymān Ḳānūnī’s first Persian
expedition (940-2/1534-5). It exists only in a single manuscript, in all
probability the dedication copy for the sultan, in the University Library in
Istanbul, and constitutes an important source for the military routes used
by the sultans for their eastern expeditions (see Albert ¶ Gabriel, Les
étapes d’une campagne dans les deux Irak d’après un manuscrit turc du
XVI e siècle in Syria (1928), 328-41; Franz Taeschner, The itinerary of
the first Persian campaign of Sultan Suleyman 1534-36, according to
Naṣūḥ al-Maṭrāḳī in Imago Mundi xiii (1956), 53-5; idem, Das Itinerar
des ersten Persienfeldzuges des Sultans Süleyman Kanuni nach Matrakçi
Nasuh , in ZMDG, 1961).

The campaign itineraries of sultans Selīm I and Süleymān I, as well as

those of Murād IV are contained, moreover, in the collection of
documents called Müns̲ h̲eʾāt al-Selāṭīn of Ferīdūn Aḥmed Beg (d.
991/1583), or his continuator (only the two volume second edition of the
Müns̲ h̲eʾāt contains the itineraries, Istanbul 1274-75/1857-59; the
itineraries there are enumerated in F. Taeschner, Das anatolische
Wegenetz nach osmanischen Quellen , i, Leipzig 1924, 20).

The most important comprehensive geographical work, constituting at the

same time the transition in Turkey from the mediaeval oriental to the
modern European point of view, is the “View of the World” (
Ḏj̲ihānnümā ) of the famous scholar Muṣṭafā b. ʿAbdallāh, known as
Kātib Čelebi [q.v.] or Ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ī K̲h̲alīfa (1017-67/1609-57). The work has a
complicated history. Kâtib Čelebi began it twice and twice it remained
uncompleted. In 1058/1648 he had begun it as cosmography in the
medieval style of such works as the one mentioned above of Meḥmed
ʿĀs̲ h̲i̊ ḳ, which he used and acknowledged. After he had described oceans,
rivers and lakes, he started on lands, of which the western came first,
Muslim Spain and North Africa. The lands of the Ottoman Empire were
to follow as the main section, which he began with the three imperial
capitals, Bursa, Edirne and Constantinople, followed by the provinces of
the European half of the empire, Rumelia, Bosnia and Hungary (from a
manuscript of this version in Vienna, J. von Hammer translated Rumeli
UND Bosna , Vienna 1812; see F. Taeschner, Die Vorlage von Hammers
“Rumeli UND Bosna” in MOG, i (1923-25), 308-10).

When Kātib Čelebī had reached the heading Hatván in writing the
description of Hungary he came across a copy of the Atlas Minor of
Gerhard Mercator, edited by Jodocus Hondius in 1621 at Arnheim. He
abandoned the D̲j̲ihānnümā and from 1064/1654 on, with the help of a
French renegade, Meḥmed Efendi Ik̲h̲lāṣī, he worked at a translation of
the atlas, to which he gave the title Lewāmiʿ al-nūr fī ẓulumāt-i Aṭlās
Mīnūr .
When this work was two-thirds finished Kâtib Čelebi began again to
write his Ḏj̲ihānnümā, according to a new plan based on the western
model. This time however he began in east Asia for which he used, in
addition to European, Oriental sources as well, such as the K̲h̲itāy-nāme
of ʿAlī Akbar; these preponderated the further west he moved. When he
had progressed in his description from east to west as far as Armenia
(Eyālet of Vān), death hastened on by an accident stayed his hand
(1067/1657). Thus the second version of his work also remained
unfinished.

Yet another European work was to provide the impulse for the
continuation of the Ḏj̲ihānnümā and eventually its completion. On 14
August 1668 the Dutch envoy Colier presented to Sultan Meḥemmed IV
in Edirne on behalf of his government a copy of the Latin edition in
eleven volumes of Blaeu’s Atlas Maior sive Cosmographia Blaviana
(1662). A few years later, in 1086/1675, the Sultan had this work
translated into Turkish by Abū Bakr b. Bahrām ¶ al-Dimas̲ h̲ḳī (d.
1102/1691). Abū Bakr published his translation under the title Nuṣrat al-
Islām wa ’l-surūr fī taḳrīr-i Aṭlas Māyūr , and based on it, with the further
use of other, especially, Oriental sources, produced a “Major Geography”
( D̲j̲ug̲h̲rāfiyā-yi
̣ kebīr ) (see P. Kahle, The Geography of Abu Bekr Ibn
Behram ad-Dimashki : Ms. A.S. 575 of the Chester Beatty Collection).

When later, in 1140/1728, the Hungarian renegade Ibrāhīm Müteferriḳa

established the first printing-press in Istanbul, the Ḏj̲ihānnümā of Kātib
Čelebi became the eleventh product (in 1145/1732) in the new Turkish art
of printing. As a basis for this edition Ibrāhīm used the second version of
the work, that is, the description of Asia begun by Kātib Čelebi, and
supplemented this with the corresponding portions (“insertions”, lāḥiḳa )
from the work of Abū Bakr, so that the printed edition included the
complete description of Asia. In the introductory chapters containing
astronomical, mathematical and geographical data, he brought the work
up to date by means of series of “printer’s addenda” ( tad̲h̲yīl al-ṭābiʿ )
(see F. Taeschner, Zur Geschichte des Djihānnumā in MSOS ii, 29
(1926), 99-111; idem., Das Hauptwerk der geographischen Literatur der
Osmanen , Kâtib Çelebis Gihannüma in Imago Mundi 1935, 44-7; Kâtip
Čelebi , Hayatı ve eserleri hakkında incelemeler , Ankara 1957: on the
Ḏj̲ihānnümā the essay by Hamit Sadi Selen, 121-36).

In 1153/1740 one S̲h̲ehrīzāde Aḥmed b. Müd̲h̲ehhib Saʿīd (d. 1178/1764-

5) undertook a further continuation of Kātib Čelebi’s Ḏj̲ihānnümā with
the title Rawḍat al-anfus . But the work was never printed owing on the
one hand to the death of Ibrāhīm Müteferriḳa (1157/1744) after which the
press was silenced and, on the other hand, to the influx of original
European literature in the face of which Turkish productions in the
geographical field lost in originality and thereby in interest.

Concerning travel descriptions those of ʿAlī Akbar from China and his
sojourn there have been mentioned. Worthy also of indication is the brief
description by Seyyidī ʿAlī Reʾīs of his journey to India and, after the
unsuccessful Ottoman naval expedition against the Portuguese in the
Indian Ocean, his fortunate return to the sultan’s court in Edirne. These
are contained in the tiny book Mirʾāt al-mamālik (completed 964/1557
and printed Istanbul 1313; Eng. tr., A. Vambéry, Travels and adventures
of the Turkish Admiral Sidi Ali Reїs .... during the years 1553-1556,
London 1899).

The major work, however, in the field of travel description is the great,
ten-volume “Travel Book” ( Seyāḥatnāme ) or “History of the Traveller”
( Taʾrīk̲h̲-i seyyāḥ ) of Ewliyā b. Derwīs̲ h̲ Meḥemmed Ẓillī, usually
known as Ewliyā Čelebi [q.v.]. It is a unique work in the entire literature
of the Islamic peoples. For forty years (1631-1670) Ewliyā Čelebi
travelled in every direction throughout the Ottoman Empire and its
neighbouring lands, largely as field chaplain in the retinues of dignitaries,
governors and ambassadors, as well as with divisions of the army. His
work is thus a kind of memoir and contains in addition to a knowledge of
the lands which he visited many insights into the higher politics of his
period. Besides his own experiences he has mingled the results of his
reading and the manifold products of his lively imagination in the work.
Through his contacts with political personalities and his participation in
their destinies, Ewliyā Čelebi’s book has become an important record for
the history of his times.

A stimulation to travel description was provided by the annual pilgrimage

to Mecca. There are indeed, especially from the 18th century, a series of
texts which describe the journey from Üsküdar, the point of departure on
the Asiatic coast of the Bosphorus for pilgrims to Mecca, and the
ceremonies accomplished in Mecca. Most of the pilgrims limited their
descriptions to the latter and touched only in passing the voyage itself.
Some, however, did describe the journey and for that reason are of
importance from the point of view of geography. The most detailed of
these is “The ceremonies of the pilgrimage” ( Manāsik al-ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ ) by
Meḥemmed Edīb (1193/1779) (printed in Istanbul 1232/1816-17; Fr. tr.
by M. Bianchi, Itinéraire de Constantinople à la Mecque in Recueil des
Voyages et des Mémoires publiés par la Société de Géographie , ii, Paris
1825, in which the work is wrongly dated 1093/1682 instead of
1193/1779).

To travel literature in a certain sense belong also the reports from the
ambassadors of the Porte to European courts ( Sefāretnāme ). These
belong at the same time to the category of historical literature, for which
reason they are generally included by the historiographers of the Empire
in their works (enumerated by me in ZDMG, lxxvii (1923), 75-8; more
completely by Faik Reşit Unat in Tarih Vesikaları , reprinted in Resimli
Tarih Mecmuası , 8 August 1950) (see further elči ).

A brief word may also be said concerning cartography. Pīrī Reʾīs’s world
map of 1513, originally in two parts, has already been described above. In
his sailing manual for the Mediterranean (the Baḥriyye ), Pīrī Reʾīs
included in each chapter, after the fashion of the Italian portulans and
probably based on them, a map representing the region of the
Mediterranean treated in the respective chapter. The late editor of the
periodical Imago Mundi , Leo Bagrov, had in his possession such a map
of the entire Mediterranean with parallel meridians, based on a mistaken
planispheric concept.

The manuscripts of the first version of Kātib Čelebi’s Ḏj̲ihānnümā have

in the margins finely sketched maps of the Liwā ( Sand̲j̲aḳ ) in question.
The 1145/1732 printing of the D̲j̲ihānnümā is provided with full-page
maps, obviously in the style of contemporary European cartography, but
with inverse orientation (north at the bottom). From the workshop of the
printer Ibrāhīm Müteferriḳa came as well a manuscript map of the Near
and Middle East, now preserved in the Austrian Military Archives, dated
either 1139/1726-7 or 1141/1728-9 (see F. Taeschner, Das anatolische
Wegenetz nach osmanischen Quellen , ii, Leipzig 1926, 62 ff.).

In conclusion brief reference may be made to the world map known as

that of Ḥad̲j̲d̲j̲ī Aḥmed of Tunis, dated 967/1559, in the Marciana in
Venice. At one time believed to be of Muslim origin, this has now been
shown to be of European manufacture, prepared for the Muslim market
(V. L. Ménage, ‘The Map of Hajji Aḥmed’ and its makers, in BSOAS, xxi,
1958, 271-314; see also George Kish, The suppressed Turkish map of
1560, Ann Arbor (William L. Clements library, 1957 [includes
facsimile]).

Bibliography
in the article, and general: F. Taeschner, Die geographische Literatur der
Osmanen, in ZDMG, lxxvii (1923), 31-80

F. Babinger, Die Geschichtsschreiber der Osmanen und ihre Werke,

Leipzig 1927, in which the geographical writers are also discussed

Abdülhak Adnan-Adivar, Osmanlı Türklerinde Ilim, Istanbul 1943

idem, La science chez les Turcs Ottomans, Paris 1939.

(Fr. Taeschner)