It is thankfully the last day of February and Spring is right around the corner. It has also been a full 28 days and I have yet to post an Explorer of the Month. Never fear.
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| Ibn Battuta, brought to you by Ibn Battua Mall in Dubai. |
I love the so called "New World". I love mountain men, and cowboys and treasure hunters and Conquistadors and natives and all of that New Worldy stuff. However, there is much more to the world than that and I decided I should talk about that as well. Not that I don't love it as well, it just isn't my specialty. So that brings me to the Explorer for this month. He is a man that traveled many thousands of miles during his life time and saw more people, places and things in his journeys than many explorers of European descent. Yet he still remains obscure to many. His name was Abu Abdullah Muhammad Ibn Abdullah Al Lawati Al Tanji Ibn Battuta. Doesn't ring a bell? Perhaps you know him simply as Ibn Battuta.
Ibn Battuta was born into a family of Islamic scholars in Tangier, Morocco (making him a Tangerine!) on the 25th of February of 1304. At the age of 21, Ibn dropped everything and left his home, family and friends behind in order to complete his Hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca. This feet would take him sixteen months to complete but he would not return to his home for 24 more years. His travels would take him across nearly every corner of of the Old World.
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| Believe it or not, this map is courtesy of "Fuck Yeah Cartography!", Google it. |
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As you can see from the map, this guy went a lot of places. He saw parts of Africa, Europe, Arabia, India, Indonesia and china. It no wonder that his trip took as long as it did. Ibn Battuta made his way to Mecca by way of Syria, he would stop in Medina to visit the tomb of Muhammad. On his way he visited many holy sites including Jerusalem and Bethlehem as well as the great port city of Alexandria. Upon reaching his destination he decided he would keep on walking in order to see the extent of the Muslim Empire. All along the road he wrote about everything he saw and compiled an autobiographical text about his journey, known today as the
Rhila. His next destination was a Mongol Khanate called Ilkhanate that was centered in Persia. This is merely the beginning of his epic journey to see the world, which is the one thing he desired the most. After ending his wanderings he relayed all of his quest to a scholar named Ibn Juzzay, to whom he said
"I have indeed - praise be to God - attained my desire in this world,
which was to travel through the Earth, and I have attained this honour,
which no ordinary person has attained." I could go on and on about what he did and saw and where Ibn Battuta went. However, I merely would like to wet your appetite for knowledge and hopefully you will take it upon yourself to learn more about this great man. I here by deem Ibn Battuta as the Explorer of the month for February 2013, 708 years and three days after his birthday. I do so on the grounds that he was a man who wanted only to see the world and to learn from what he found. I can think of no better definition of an explorer than that.
There are a ton of books about Ibn Battuta and his travels; here is a link to Amazon.com that will provide a good jumping off point for those interested.
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_5?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=ibn+battuta&sprefix=Ibn+B%2Cstripbooks%2C142&rh=n%3A283155%2Ck%3Aibn+battuta
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