An elephant all ready for entertainment.
Abd Ibn Al Zahir: Kitab al-Rawdah al-Bahiyah
(The Book of the Beautiful Garden)(d1293) Egypt
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Muhyi d-Din ibn Abd az-Zahir (1223–1293) was an Egyptian chancery scribe, poet and historian during the Mamluk period. Parts of his geographical work entitled Kitab al-Rawḍa l-bahiyya al-zahira fi khitat al-Mu’izziyya l-Qahira survived. The accounts of several embassies to or from Egypt show products and slaves of East Africa being donated.
Taken from: Practising Diplomacy in the Mamluk Sultanate: Gifts and Material Culture in ...by Doris Behrens-Abouseif
Du système mercantile à l'ordre diplomatique : les ambassades entre Égypte mamluke et Yemen rasulide by Eric Vallet.
Beyond the Legacy of Genghis Khan edited by Linda Komaroff.
(Embassy 1263)
Baybars (1) send to Berke Khan (2) of the Golden Horde (3): elephants, giraffes, fabulous trained monkeys, noble Arabian racing steeds, wild spotted asses from Yemen (Zebras?) a kind of Egyptian asses, and rare Nubian camels with gear and costumes for these beasts. Also eunuchs and slave-girl cooks……
(Embassy 666/1268)
Envoys of the ruler of Yemen arrived [to Baybars (1) ruler of Egypt]; they gave him twenty horses topped decorated with embroidered satin several elephants and the striped onager (attabiyya), which are the best animals in terms of color, then, as usual, the quantities of musk, amber, aloe wood of Qumar (4) and Kalah (6), silver objects, sandstone and Chinese porcelain.
(Embassy between 1250-1295)
Envoys from Yemen to the court of the Mamluk sultan Al Zahir Baybars (1)included as gifts a black bear and an elephant.
(Embassy 684/1285)
Saturday 1st of Dhu al-qada that year [684/29 Dec. 1285] came the messenger of the ruler of Yemen, along with gifts and presents. He stood before al-Malik al-Mansur (5). Among the gifts were thirteen eunuchs, ten horses, non castrated slaves, elephant, rhinoceros (harkand), eight sheep, eight parrots, three pieces of large aloes wood, each piece being supported by two men, forty spears qana ......
(1) Baybars: (1223/1228 – 1277), of Turkic Kipchak origin, was the fourth Mamluk sultan of Egypt.
(2) Berke Khan:(died 1266) was a grandson of Genghis Khan.
(3) the Golden Horde: was originally a Mongol and later Turkicized khanate established in the 13th century and originating as the northwestern sector of the Mongol Empire.
(4) Qumar: Kumr or Madagascar
(5) al-Malik al-Mansur of Yemen: (r 1229-1250) First Rasulid ruler of Southern Yemen and Tihama, with their capital at Ta'izz.
(6) Kalah: very important harbour in Malaysia in those days.