Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn al-Husayn al-Mas'udi was born in Baghdad around 896 CE and spent most of his life traveling, visiting Persia, India, Sri Lanka, East Africa, the Caspian Sea region, Syria, and Egypt, recording his observations and the accounts he heard of various nations.
He compiled his encyclopedic 'Muruj al-Dhahab wa Ma'adin al-Jawhar' ('Meadows of Gold'), combining general history with geography and descriptions of peoples' customs and religions, moving beyond political history into the study of societies and human nature.
Legacy
Al-Mas'udi settled in Egypt in his later years and died in Fustat in 956 CE. He is regarded as one of the earliest practitioners of a method approaching modern historical and social writing, earning him the epithet 'the Herodotus of the Arabs'.
