Abu Abd Allah Muhammad al-Abdari

Abu Abd Allah Muhammad al-Abdari wrote the Rihla al-Maghribiyya, an account of his journey. The encyclopaedia's entry is signed by Muh. Ben Cheneb and W. Hoenerbach. His birth and death dates are unknown, and the biographical dictionaries mention him only through his book, although later scholars held him in high regard. ¹

He began his journey on 25 Dhu l-Qa'da 688 (December 1289), setting out from the Haha country near Mogador. The encyclopaedia says that he had Sufi leanings, shown by his interest in the cult of saints, and that he received a Sufi khirqa from a shaykh at Tunis. In politics he seems to have been a partisan of the Marinids, and he could not publish the book in Tlemcen on his return. ¹

On the way he studied with scholars in Cairo, Tunis and Kairouan, among them al-Dimyati, Ibn Daqiq al-'Id and Abu Zayd al-Asadi. His son Muhammad, known as Ibn al-Hadidi, and Abu l-Qasim ibn Ridwan were his pupils. The book describes the state of Muslim scholarship and teaching, the books studied and the certificates (ijaza) he obtained, and it gives poems, including one addressed to the Ayyubid sultan Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub, asking him to deliver the lands of Islam from the Christian yoke. The encyclopaedia says the book is less important for geography than for the history of Maghribi scholars, and that Ibn Battuta and later writers used it. ¹