Thinkers Timeline

Ibn Battuta was a Moroccan traveller, scholar, and writer. He travelled more widely than almost anyone else in the medieval world. Over about 30 years, he visited most of the Muslim world and far beyond, covering an estimated 120,000 kilometres. His travel book is one of the great works of medieval literature. He was born in 1304 in Tangier, on the northern coast of Morocco. His full name was Muhammad ibn Abdullah ibn Battuta. He came from a family of Muslim judges who followed the Maliki school of Islamic law. He was educated as a religious scholar. In 1325, aged 21, he left home to make the hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. He travelled across North Africa to Egypt, then up through Palestine and Syria, and on to Mecca. He completed the pilgrimage. Then he kept going. Curiosity and ambition kept him moving for the next 24 years. He travelled across Iraq, Persia, East Africa, Anatolia, Central Asia, India, the Maldives, Sri Lanka, Bengal, and possibly China. He served as a judge in several places, including in the Indian sultanate of Delhi, where he worked for the powerful Sultan Muhammad ibn Tughluq. In 1349 he returned home to Morocco. After more shorter trips to Spain and across the Sahara to Mali, he settled down. The Sultan of Morocco asked him to dictate the story of his travels to a court scholar named Ibn Juzayy. The book was finished around 1355. Ibn Battuta lived another 13 or 14 years and died around 1369. His grave is in Tangier.