A worldmap left and a map of the seven climes on top from Biruni.
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Al Biruni; Tarhdeid nikeayeat al-aneakin (the book of the demarcation of the limits of the areas)
Taken from ; The determination of the coordinates of positions for the correction of distances between cities; a translation from the Arabic of Kitab tahdid nihayat al-amakin translation by Jamil Ali
P104
The equator starts from the sea in the west, beyond the towns of the black people of the west, then it passes through sands and uninhabited lands near the sources of the Nile, then south of Zanj
beyond Nubia, then through Didjat (1) and Waqwaq islands (2), and the Zabaj (3) islands in the east. All those living below the equator are wild brutes who eat human beings, but among people
living north of the equator, such wild and brutal disposition and customs disappear gradually....
p108
The sea which issues forth from the ocean west of Zanj and at the promontory called Barasun (4) extends similarly to the south of the equator, and spreads out along the coasts of the Sudan and
south of Zanj. Both seas fall directly under the influence of the sun, moon, and the planets, and hence their airs are soft, and navigation in their waters is smooth.
Al Biruni : from J.F. P. Hopkins : Corpus of early Arabic sources for West Africa.
(an explanation of Biruni's idea of the world as he brought it with him from India. East Africa is put in nr. 1 HIND . The inscription reads : India; Sind, and the islands related to them such as
the Sundra archipelago, the Eastern Coast of Africa.
Taken from: Nafis Ahmad; Muslim Contributions to Geography
And I say: Most of the data of the Geography (of Ptolemy) concerning the longitude and latitude of points on the earth have really been adopted only
on the ground of rumors which had come from far-off districts. In the practical use of such data Ptolemy himself must hit on the right way ; but others have only imitated him and it is possible
that the latter, moreover, have diverged from the right way. Anyhow, the ground on which these data rest is mere report; indeed those lands were very difficult of access in the past owing to the
national divisions, for national division is the greatest obstacle to travel in countries. We see, for example, some people who want— as do the Jews— to come nearer to God through treacherous
attacks on folk of other nationalities. Or they take foreigners as slaves, as do the Romans, and that is the lesser evil. Or travelers because they are foreigners, are turned back, held in every
kind of suspicion and they are thus brought to a very unpleasant and dangerous plight. But now [the circumstances are quite different]. Islam has already penetrated from the eastern countries of
the earth to the western. It spread westwards to Spain (Andalus) eastward to the borderland of China and to the middle of India, southwards to Abyssinia and the countries of the Zanj, northwards
to the countries of the Turks and Slavs. Thus the different peoples (al-Umam al-Mukhtalifah) are brought together in mutual understanding (ulfat) , which only God's own Art can bring to pass. And
of those (who could be obstructive to cultural relations) only common vagabonds and highway-robbers are left. The remaining obstinate unbelievers have become timid and tame ; they now respect the
followers of Islam and seek peace with them. To obtain information concerning places of the Earth has now become incomparably easier and safer (than it was before). Now we find a crowd of places,
which in the (Ptolematic) 'Geography' are indicated as lying to the east of other places, actually situated to the west of the others named, and vice versa. The reason (of such errors) are either
confusion of the data as to the distance on which the longitude and latitude were estimated or that the population have changed their former places.
(1) Didjat: Didadjat islands; Dibayat; =Maldives
(2) Waqwaq islands: in the books three different places are called Waqwaq: in South-East Africa; in Indonesia; around Japan. Here around the Maldives is meant.
(3) Zabaj island: one of the main islands of Indonesia (Sumatra).
(4) Barasun: al-Biruni describes Barasun commanding an ocean west of the lands of Zanj—in other words, the Atlantic on the opposite side of the continent from the coastal belt of East Africa.