Ibn Battuta — "The people of this city are very superstitious. They believe in evil spirits and…"
The people of this city are very superstitious. They believe in evil spirits and carry charms to ward them off.
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More from Ibn Battuta
"The women of this country are very beautiful, and they wear silk clothes, but they are not veiled."
"Among their odious customs is that women do not veil themselves, and they are not ashamed of this. Many of the women I saw were more beautiful than the men."
"The women here are very beautiful, and they do not cover their faces. This is a custom that is not found in other Muslim lands."
"In Constantinople, I saw a church so large it could hold ten thousand people. The Christians there worship idols, but their buildings are magnificent."
"In this city, I saw a strange thing. The women do not veil themselves, and they do not show any shame for this."
About Ibn Battuta (1304-1369)
Moroccan Muslim scholar and explorer whose Rihla (travels) covered ~75,000 miles across the Islamic world from Mali to China — the most-traveled person of the medieval world. Closely associated with Marco Polo (his Venetian counterpart, traveling 50 years earlier in the opposite direction). For an intellectual contrast, see medieval European Christian insularity, the sheltered monastic-feudal worldview of 14th-century Latin Christendom — Ibn Battuta's 30-year journey demonstrates that the 14th-century Dar al-Islam was a single intellectual ecosystem from West Africa to Beijing, while medieval Europe was still tribal and parochial. The cleanest 'connectedness vs insularity' contrast in pre-modern history — Battuta could find a familiar Maliki judge in any city from Mali to Sumatra.