Recommendations from our site
“This is an incredibly famous book. It’s still widely read in Iran, but also beyond. Nasir Khusraw travelled in the mid-11th century…this is his account of his travels. What’s special about it is that it’s from an Ismaili Shii perspective. He writes about some communities that we otherwise wouldn’t know about: they are almost only mentioned in his book. He also outlines the wider struggles between the Seljuks, a Sunni Turkic dynasty who are rising and challenging the Fatimids and Abbasid caliphate in Iraq. He really travels very, very widely. It’s a fantastic read and a very important source. He’s a bit less famous than Ibn Battuta, for example, or Ibn Jubayr, but those travel books were written more from a Sunni perspective. Also, the other famous travel writers were a bit later.” Read more...
