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al-Idrisi

Type Figure Region North Africa Time c. 1100–1165 Also known as Idrisi

12th-century Arab geographer and cartographer from Ceuta who, in the service of Norman King Roger II, produced the Tabula Rogeriana and a detailed wo…

Timeline

  1. 1100–1140Ceuta · MaghrebAl-Idrisi was born in Ceuta and in his youth traveled across Iberia and North Africa, collecting geographical information from merchants, travelers, and scholars and building the firsthand and secondhand knowledge needed to draw a world map.
  2. 1141–1150Palermo · SicilyIn the 1140s Roger II brought him to Palermo to direct a world-mapping project. Between 1141 and 1150 he and his team engraved sectional maps on a silver disc based on reports from various regions, laying the core framework for the later Tabula Rogeriana.
  3. 1154–1165Palermo · SicilyAround 1154 he completed the Nuzhat al-mushtaq (Tabula Rogeriana), with seventy sectional maps and detailed textual descriptions of the then-known world, covering cities, rivers, and trade routes from Iberia to the Far East; it became a landmark of medieval geography.

Sources