Al-Yaqubi

[KALKI]

Yaqubi, Al-

(full name, Ahmad ibn Abu Yaqub ibn Jafar ibn Wahb ibn Wadih al-Yaqubi). Year of birth unknown; died 897. Arab historian.
A Shiite Muslim, al Yaqubi was born in Baghdad. He lived in Armenia, Khorasan, and Egypt and traveled in India and the Maghrib. He was the author of the systematic geography Book of the Countries (c. 891) and Chronicle of Ibn Wadih, which dealt with the history of Assyria, Egypt, Greece, and other countries of antiquity, as well as the history of Islam and the Arabian Caliphate up to 872. Al-Yaqubi died in Egypt.
WORKS

Kitab al-Boldan. (BGA, vol. 7.) Leiden, 1892.
Historiae, vols. 1–2. Edited by M. T. Houtsma. Leiden, 1883.


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al-Yaʿqūbī, in full Aḥmad Ibn Abū Yaʿqūb Ibn Jaʿfar Ibn Wahb Ibn Wāḍiḥ Al-yaʿqūbī (died 897, Egypt), Arab historian and geographer, author of a history of the world, Tāʾrīkh ibn Wāḍiḥ (“Chronicle of Ibn Wāḍiḥ”), and a general geography, Kitāb al-buldān (“Book of the Countries”).

Until 873 al-Yaʿqūbī lived in Armenia and Khorāsān, under the patronage of the Iranian dynasty of the Ṭāḥirids, and wrote his history there. After the fall of the Ṭāḥirids he trav eled to India and the Maghrib (North Africa) and died in Egypt.

The Tāʾrīkh ibn Wāḍiḥ is divided into two parts. The first is a comprehensive account of pre-Islāmic and non-Islāmic peoples, especially of their religion and literature; it includes extracts from the Greek philosophers and accounts from stories and fables. The second part covers Islāmic history up to 872. The author’s Shīʿite bias pervades the work.

In the Kitāb al-buldān, a large part of which is lost, al-Yaʿqūbī analyzes statistics, topography, and taxation in describing the larger cities of Iraq, Iran, Arabia, Syria, Egypt, the Maghrib, India, China, and the Byzantine Empire.

[KALKI]

Yaqubi the 9th century Muslim historian has written:

"The Hindus are superior to all other nations in intelligence and thoughtfulness. They are more exact in astronomy and astrology than any other people.

The Siddhanta is a good proof of their intellectual powers; by this book the Greeks and Persians have also profited. In medicine their opinion ranks first."

(source: The Vision of India - By Sisirkumar Mitra p. 226).