A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18 eBook

Robert Kerr (writer)
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 938 pages of information about A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels.

A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18 eBook

Robert Kerr (writer)
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 938 pages of information about A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels.

In the middle of the twelfth century, Al Edrissi composed at the court of Roger King of Sicily, whose subject he was, his Geographical Amusements.  In this work we find little that relates to commerce:  its geographical details will assist us when we give our sketch of the geographical knowledge of the Arabians.

In the work of [Ebor->Ebn] Al Ouardi, which was drawn up in 1232, Africa, Arabia, and Syria are minutely described; but comparatively little is said on Europe, India, and the North of Asia.

The next Arabian geographer in point of time is Abulfeda:  he wrote a very particular description of the earth, the countries being arranged according to climates, with the latitude and longitude of each place.  In the introduction to this work he enters on the subject of mathematical geography, and describes the most celebrated mountains, rivers, and seas of the world.  Abulfeda was a native of Syria; and this and the adjacent countries are described with most fullness and accuracy:  the same remark applies to his description of Egypt and the north coast of Africa.  The information contained in his work, respecting Tartary, China, &c., is not nearly so full and minute as might have been expected, considering the intercourse of the Arabians with those countries.  Of Europe, and all other parts of Africa except Egypt and the north coast, he gives little or no information.

Within these very few years, some valuable notices have been received, through M. Burckhardt, and Mr. Kosegarten of Jena, of Ibn Batouta, an Arabian traveller of the fourteenth century.  According to M. Burckhardt, he is, perhaps, the greatest land traveller that ever wrote his travels.  He was a native of Tangier, and travelled for thirty years, from 1324 to 1354.  He traversed more than once Egypt, Syria, Arabia, Persia, the coast of the Red Sea, and the eastern coast of Africa.  Bochara, Balk, Samarcand, Caubul, India, and China, were visited by him:  he even ventured to explore several of the Indian islands; crossed the mountains of Thibet, traversed India, and then, taking shipping, went to Java.  He again visited China, and returned thence by Calicut, Yeman, Bagdad, and Damascus, to Cairo.  After having visited Spain, he directed his travels to Africa; reached the capital of Morocco, and thence as far as Sodjalmasa.  From this place he crossed the Desert with the slave merchants to Taghary—­twenty-five days journey:  he represents the houses here as built of rock salt, and covered with camel skins.  For twenty days more he crossed a desert without water or trees, and the sand of which was so loose, that it left no traces of footsteps.  He now arrived at the frontier town of Soudan.  After travelling for some time longer, he reached the banks of the Niger, which, according to the information he received, flowed into the Nile at the second cataract.  He visited Tombuctoo and other places in this part of Africa, and finished his travels at Fez.

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A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels - Volume 18 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.