Abū Ḥāmid al-Gharnāṭī, Muḥammad b. Sulaymān b. al-Rabīʿ al-Māzinī al-Qaysī (473–565/1080–1170), was a traveller and geographer from Granada. His kunya is given variously as Abū ʿAbd Allāh, Abū Bakr and Abū Muḥammad, and it is reported that his father's name was either ʿAbd al-Raḥīm or ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (al-Dhahabī, 39; Abū Ḥāmid al-Gharnāṭī, 17; al-Ṣafadī, 3/245–246).

Abū Ḥāmid was a remarkable traveller, indeed, almost a ‘tourist’ in the modern sense. Yet he did not write down his experiences in the form of a diary. Rather, as was common in those days…