Abu Dulaf al-Khazraji

Flourished 943–952

Travel writer

Source

Abu Dulaf al-Khazraji exploited the popular interest in travel to enhance his reputation as a litterateur. An Iranian frequenting the court of a local ruler in western Iran during the mid tenth century, he wrote two travel accounts. The first purports to report on a delegation sent by the Samanid ruler Nasr ibn Ahmad (ruled 914–943) of eastern Iran to negotiate a royal marriage with the ruler of China. Abu Dulaf s short, and at times fanciful, descriptions of the peoples he encountered are in seemingly illogical order, and the few words he devoted to an alleged return to Iran by way of China, Malaya, and India have led scholars to doubt that he ever made the journey. More likely, he collected information from travelers in the Samanid capital of Bukhara and fabricated a narrative to please the reading public. Scholars have been more generous in their appraisal of his second account, which is devoted solely to travels within Iran. Even here, however, the information from western Iran is distinctly more plausible and geographically coherent than the lore pertaining to more eastern provinces. In a third work, a long poem with extensive explanatory notes, Abu Dulaf described the activities of another class of travelers in medieval Islamic society, the “guild” of beggars, street performers, and confidence tricksters. This colorful group, known as the Banu Sasan, excited the same sort of interest among Abu Dulaf’s audience of educated courtiers that a modern account of underworld or circus life might excite today. Abu Dulaf’s work testifies to the popularity of stories about exotic peoples and locales even as it casts doubt on his personal honesty.

Source

Richard W. Bulliet, “Abu Dolaf al-Yanbu’i, Mes’ar b. Mohalhel al-Kazraji,” in Encyclopaedia Iranica (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1985), I: 271–272.