On 14 June 1325 the 21-year-old Moroccan legal scholar Ibn Battuta left Tangier on a pilgrimage to Mecca. He did not return for 24 years and travelled about 120,000 km, through North Africa, Egypt, Arabia, Persia, East Africa, Anatolia, Central Asia, India, the Maldives, South-East Asia and China, and later Mali. He served as a judge in Delhi for the Sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq and survived shipwreck and robbers. He dictated his Rihla, 'Journey', in 1355 to Ibn Juzayy. It is our best source for the Muslim world in the fourteenth century, and he travelled farther than Marco Polo.
Before and after
- 1325Construction of Khotyn Fortress
- 1325Birth of Hafez
- 1325Origins of Templo Mayor
- 13 March 1325Founding of Mexico City
- 14 June 1325Ibn Battuta sets out from Tangier
- 1330Construction of Riga Castle
- from 1331 to 1333Gümmenenkrieg
- 27 May 1332Birth of Ibn Khaldun
- 1334Construction of Sheikh Safi al-Din Khānegāh and Shrine Ensemble
More in Exploration & discovery
- 972 CEBirth of Leif Erikson
- 1021Vikings are at L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland
- from 1271 to 1295Marco Polo sets out for China
- c. 1280sPolynesian navigators settle New Zealand
- 1368Death of Ibn Battuta
- c. 1435Death of Zheng He
The era
This moment belongs to the Medieval world (500 CE to 1500 CE), kingdoms, faiths and trade routes. You can also browse everything in the 14th century.