Ibn al-Wardi


Abū Ḥafs Zayn al-Dīn ʻUmar ibn al-Muẓaffar Ibn al-Wardī, known as Ibn al-Wardi, was an Arab historian -, the author of Kharīdat al-ʿAjā'ib wa farīdat al-gha'rāib, a geographical treatise with sections on natural history. He also wrote Tarikh Ibn al-Wardi.

Kharidat

The Kharīdat summed up the geographical knowledge of the Arabic world of the time, referring to climate, terrain, fauna and flora, population, way of living, existing states and their governments in individual regions of the world. The work was accompanied by a coloured world map and a picture of Ka'bah.
Although in the book al-Wardi credits al-Mas'udi, al-Tusi and several other sources, Mohamed Bencheneb claimed it was merely a plagiarism of a book by Egyptian writer Najm ad-Dīn Aḥmad ibn Ḥamdān ibn Shabib al-Ḥanbali, entitled Jāmi ʿal-Funūn wa-Salwat al-Maḥzūn. As for the first chapter of the Kharidat, although it may have well come indirectly through al-Ḥanbali as Bencheneb suggests, it is in fact very nearly a copy from Yaqut's Mu'jam ul-Buldān, including similar phraseology.
The author also speaks about Slavs and their lifestyle and mentions al-Mahdiyya as the residence of the Fatimid dynasty. Therefore, the book is older than the city of Kairo.