Description: This is the first English translation of the Tarikh al-Mustabsir, written in the early quarter of the thirteenth century by Ibn al-Mujawir. The text is a fascinating account of the western and southern areas of the Arabian Peninsula by a man from the east of the Islamic world, probably from Khurasan in Iran, and provides a unique source for social and economic history, written with a humour and wit otherwise unknown in the writings of medieval Islam. This translation is fully annotated with an introduction, appendices, glossary and full index, and contains maps and illustrations.
Review Quotes: '...a major event in the world of Arabian studies. ...it is a work of considerable scholarship. Prominent among its many strengths are the attention given to elucidating Ibn al-Mujawir's often garbled accounts of contemporary and earlier political and dynastic history, and to commenting on his dense information concerning trade, commercial practice, taxes, weights and measures. Most important, through his twenty years of textual travels in and around Tarikh al-Mustabsir, Professor Smith has opened up the broad landscape of Ibn al-Mujawir's Arabia, in all its richness, strangeness and - not least - comedy, to a wide a new readership.' Bibliotheca Orientalis '... we can only be full of admiration about what has been achieved here.' Journal of the American Oriental Society