PART 1THE JOURNEY BEGIN

Ibn Battuta started on his travels when he was 21 years old in 1325.

His main reason to travel was to go on a Hajj, or the Pilgrimage to Makkah (Mecca), as all Muslims are instructed to do.

In 1325, he left Tangier, his born place to make a pilgrimage to Makkah (Mecca). He was eager for more learning and adventure.

Ibn Battuta travelled overland at first alone riding a donkey. Then for protection he joined a caravan with other pilgrims and traders.

The trip was a grand study tour of the World of Islam - Dar al-Islam.

For Ibn Battuta it was an opportunity to acquire knowledge of religion and law, and meet with other Muslim scholars.

From Tangier, the travelers arrived at the port of Algiers where they camped outside the city walls waiting for other pilgrims to join the caravan.

Then they traveled through forests of oak and cedar, mountains and valleys before reaching the city of Bijaya.

Here Ibn Battuta became ill, but he pushed on anxious to get on with his trip. He was advised to stay and rest, but he insisted on continuing.

Next the group of travelers entered Tunis, a city of about 100,000 - a major city of Islamic art and learning.

It contained splendid mosques and palaces, public gardens, colleges and a shipping port of north African products.

Here he stayed in a college (madrasa) dormitory and met with the scholars and judges in high positions.

The group left Tunis in a larger caravan of pilgrims and Ibn Battuta was even appointed qadi (judge and settler of disputes) for the hajj caravan.

His caravan continued across the coastal Libyan countryside. Near Tripoli a band of camel robbers attacked the caravan waving their swords

Sometime in 1326, the caravan reached Alexandria at the western end of the Nile Delta. Ibn Battuta was very impressed with Alexandria.

At this time Alexandria was a busy harbor firmly controlled by Egypt's Mamluk warrior caste who had governed that country.

Ibn Battuta visited other cities on the Nile Delta, and continued on to Cairo (or "al-Qahirah" - "the Victorious") founded in the 10th century by the Fatimid dynasty.

Ibn Battuta goes on to describe the city's many mosques, colleges, hospitals, and convents which housed the poor.

JOURNEY TO THE JERUSALEMIbn Battuta left Cairo and headed to Damascus, Syria along

the Royal Road. The Mamluk government organized caravans to carry

pilgrims and merchants along this trail. At this time, Mamluk Empire had been in fierce battles with

Mongol Invaders.Then he arrived at Damascus, where he could connect with

a Hajj caravan and complete his trip to Makkah in safety.There were also other holy sites to see on this part of his

trip: Al-Khalil (Hebron), Al-Quds (Jerusalem), Bethlehem, and more.

Hebron is a holy site for Muslims, Christians, and Jews since it is the burial place of the "fathers" or "patriarchs" of monotheism (belief in one God): Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Continuing northward he visited and described more holy places, many towns destroyed by the crusades, such as Tyre and Acre, and he described many castles.

Then he arrived in Jerusalem which was a rather small town at that time, with a population of only about 10,000.

Ibn Battuta stayed in Jerusalem for about one week. Because the Hajj season would begin soon, he continued on to Damascus and arrived there during the Holy Month of Ramadan, 1326.

Damascus had once been the capital of the Umayyad Empire founded by Muawiya

At the time Ibn Battuta visited Damascus, it was an international supermarket. Its population was about 100,000 people.

During his stay in the city, Ibn Battuta may have lived in this mosque's dormitory, sitting beneath the marble columns and listening to lecturers and Quranic readers.

He spent much of his time studying and meeting famous teachers and judges.

His entire stay in Damascus took place during the month of Ramadan.

Here he married again, but divorced shortly afterward, and later he had fathered a son.

He learned about having a son after he had continued on, and later sent a present of money to him.

THE HAJJ, MACCA AND MEDINAThe Hajj caravan was probably several thousand people. Because Ibn Battuta is poor, a law professor hired

camels for him and gave him traveling provisions, and money. And so he finally began his hajj.

The distance from Damascus to Medina was about 820 miles, and the caravan normally covered it in 45 to 60 days.

Without any serious incidents, the caravan arrived at Medina, City of the Apostle of God - a little island of fertility in the desert.

After he left Medina, Ibn Battuta performed the rituals within Mecca dressed in the simple white "ihram" cloth worn.

Ibn Battuta stayed in Mecca for three weeks making visits to other sites, meeting with holy men, and studied with them.

He had taken a year and a half to reach his destination of Mecca from his homeland of Morocco, and he would make three other trips to Mecca in his lifetime.

But rather than return home, he thought about the adventures of travel, of getting a job as a scholar or judge.

PART 2THE JOURNEY CONTINUE

MeccaCairo,

Palestine & Syria

Aley ( Asia Minor)

Black Sea

ConstantinopleKhurasanHindukus

hDelhi

Goa Maldive Islands Ma’bar Bengal

Across Anatolia & Sinope by

sea

Visited cities

Enjoys the patronage of

Sultan Muhammad

Tughlaq

Sumatra Canton China Peking

Dhafari & Muscat

Mecca

Sent as Sultan’s envoy to

China

•Through Paris, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Egypt•Made his 7th & last pilgrimage(Nov 1348 Masihi•Returned to hometown (Fez)

PART 3 : THE LAST JOURNEYAfter Ibn Battuta returned to Fez in 1354, the Sultan

of Morocco listened to his report on Mali,West Africa. He also listened to Ibn Battuta's other adventures, and

ordered him to stay in Fez.He wanted to have these stories written down for the

amusement of his family and others. So Ibn Battuta was commanded to dictate an account

of the cities which he had seen in his travel, and of the interesting events which had clung to his memory.

The Sultan hired a young writer - Ibn Juzayy - the young man Ibn Battuta had met in Granada three years earlier.

Ibn Juzayy must have been excited about such a task.He had been fascinated by Ibn Battuta's stories earlier,

and as a young writer, this job was one that could earn him respect.

He was to put the stories into the proper form of a travel book, called a "rihla".

And so began the retelling of his adventures that had begun twenty-nine years before. Ibn Battuta wove his observations and hearsay, history and odds and ends into his story.

Ibn Juzayy added poetry here and there, but generally he kept to Ibn Battuta's telling.

Ibn Juzayy borrowed descriptions of Mecca, Medina and Damascus from a twelfth century traveler named Ibn Jubayr, and perhaps descriptions of other places from other travelers, too. And so the book grew.

When it was finished, The Rihla had little impact upon the Muslim world.

However, it was copied by hand and the whole book or shortened versions might be found in some libraries, or carried around by travelers who followed on parts of his trips.

It was not until the 19th century that some of the Arabic books were found and translated into French, German, and then English.

Then the book began to receive the attention it deserves as a record of history.

Ibn Battuta died in 1368 or 1369.Tour guides in Tangier take tourists to see an

unmarked grave that they claim to be his, but no one can confirm it as his final resting place.

MeccaCairo,

Palestine & Syria

Aley ( Asia Minor)

Black Sea

ConstantinopleKhurasanHindukus

hDelhi

Goa Maldive Islands Ma’bar Bengal

Across Anatolia & Sinope by

sea

Visited cities

Enjoys the patronage of

Sultan Muhammad

Tughlaq

Sumatra Canton China Peking

Dhafari & Muscat

Mecca

Sent as Sultan’s envoy to

China

•Through Paris, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Egypt•Made his 7th & last pilgrimage(Nov 1348 Masihi•Returned to hometown (Fez)

The Journey of Ibn BatuttaPart 1

Tangier Tunis Libyan Alexandria

CairoDamascus, SyriaJerusalemDamascusMecca

Medina Mecca Monggol Persian Basra

Isfahan ShirazBaghdad Tabriz Baghdad

Mecca