This four-volume edition of the Arabic text of the Journey of the Moroccan traveller Ibn Battuta (1304-68/9), with a French translation, was published in 1853-8 as part of the 'Collection d'ouvrages orientaux' of the French Societe Asiatique. In 1325, Ibn Battuta, who came from a family of Islamic jurists in Tangier, set out to make the pilgrimage to Mecca - the beginning of a journey that would last for twenty-four years and take him as far as China. After travels which took him, by land and sea, to the furthest boundaries of the then known world, including modern-day Tanzania, Timbuktu, China, the Philippines, the Crimea and Spain, he returned home and dictated this account. There is doubt as to whether Ibn Battuta actually saw everything he described, but his remarkable narrative gives a fascinating view of kingdoms and peoples which very few travellers of the period had visited.

Edited and translated by: Charles Defremery, Beniamino Raffaello Sanguinetti