Surat al-Ard (Ibn Hawqal)

Surat al-Ard ("The Image of the Earth") is Abu al-Qasim Ibn Hawqal al-Nasibi's geography of the lands of Islam. Some copies carry the title "Routes and Realms, Deserts and Perils, and an account of the provinces and lands through the ages, the nature of their people and the properties of the lands themselves, their revenues, land tax and yields". ¹

• Ibn Hawqal says he wrote the book on the shape of the earth and its extent in length and breadth, and on the provinces and their waste and cultivated land, "of all the lands of Islam", detailing their cities and districts. ⁴
• He did not follow the division of the earth into seven climes, because "the Indian image", though correct, is very confused. Instead he made "a drawing and shape" for each region showing its position, then described its surroundings and its cities, rivers, seas, wealth, revenues, tithes, land tax, distances and trade. ⁴
• He says that what moved him to write was his love, since boyhood, of reading books of routes, in none of which he found a satisfying work. Continuous travel helped him, and so did his uprooting from his homeland in search of a living, through the injustice of rulers and the hardships besetting the people of the east. ⁴
• His aim, he says, is "to portray these regions, which no one I know of who saw them has described". He left out fuller accounts of notable men and rulers to avoid tedium. ⁵

He set out from Baghdad, "the City of Peace", on Thursday 7 Ramadan 331 AH. That was the day Abu Muhammad al-Hasan ibn 'Abd Allah ibn Hamdan, titled Nasir al-Dawla, fled the city in defeat for Diyar Rabi'a. Ibn Hawqal was then still young. ²

In this edition the book runs in two parts: ³

• Part one: the image of the earth, Arabia, the Persian Sea, the Maghrib, al-Andalus, Sicily, Egypt, Syria, the Mediterranean, the Jazira and Iraq.
• Part two: Khuzistan, Fars, Kirman, Sind, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Arran, the Jibal, Daylam and Tabaristan, the Caspian, the desert of Khurasan and Fars, Sijistan, Khurasan, Transoxiana, and the conclusion.

The publisher's preface says Ibn Hawqal took the al-Masalik wa-al-Mamalik of Abu Ishaq al-Istakhri, rewrote it keeping its title, and ascribed it to himself. It adds that several later authors drew on his book, especially Yaqut in Mu'jam al-Buldan. This is the publisher's judgement. ⁶

Published by Dar Maktabat al-Hayat in Beirut in 1992, in two parts. The publisher notes that the book was printed twice at Leiden: first as al-Masalik wa-al-Mamalik wa-al-Mafawiz wa-al-Mahalik, then in an improved edition as Surat al-Ard. ^{7 6}