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Ali ibn Yusuf al-Qifti: Tarikh al-Hukama:

(History of Learned Men) (d1248)

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Taken from: Alwaraq

….. united the land of Egypt in the length of Cyrenaica (1), which in the south of the Rum (Rome) sea to Elath (2) of the Gulf Coast of Abyssinia Sea and Zinj, India and China, a distance close to forty days alone from the city of Aswan (3), which the highest Nile Egypt …….


Al-Qifti: al-Muhammadun min al-shu'ard' wa-ash'druhum. (Report of the Muhammad Poets) (d1248)

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Taken from: Der Neger in der Bildersprache der arabischen Dichter By Manfred Ullmann

 

P221

(citing Muhammad ibn Atiya ibn Hayyan al katib al Majribi)

It is as if the coals and the ashes and what the fires have done to them are like an old zanj with a grey head and wearing a gold-colored shirt.

p268

Don't you see how a light breeze gets into the sleeping curls (of the boys) so that they fall partially on his cheek. It is as if a Zanj was spreading his fingers to grab the embers, but he cannot.

P285

(Citing: Abu Ali Muhammad ibn al Husain ibn Abd Allah ibn Ahmad ibn Yusuf ibn as-Sibl (d1080) Baghdad)

Do you not see how the entrances to the night are locked, as she lets her hair-full fall full width and long.

She seems to be a powerful Zanjiyya-ruler, who is crowned with different diadems.

 

Note: My reason for adding so much poetry is that it gives a less racist picture then the philosophers give.

(1) Cyrenaica: is the eastern coastal region of Libya.

(2) Elath; Eilat is a southern Israeli port and resort town on the Red Sea, near Jordan.

(3) Aswan: southern border town on the Nile in Egypt.