Ibn Battuta — "The women of this city are very beautiful, but they are not modest."
The women of this city are very beautiful, but they are not modest.
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More from Ibn Battuta
"The people of this city are very fond of music and dancing. They have festivals every night, and the streets are always full of revelry."
"Who lives sees, but who travels sees more."
"The women of this country are very beautiful, and they wear rings on their toes."
"The juggler then took the limbs of the boy and applied them one to another: he then stamped upon them, and it stood up complete and erect. I was astonished, and was seized in consequence by a palpitat…"
"The women of this country do not cover their heads, and they are not ashamed of this. We saw many of them whose faces were more beautiful than the faces of the men."
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.