Leo Africanus

Johannes Leo Africanus (born al-Hasan Muhammad al-Wazzan al-Fasi, الحسن محمد الوزان الفاسي ; c. 1494 – 1554) was a Berber Andalusi diplomat and author who is best known for his 1526 book Cosmographia et geographia de Affrica, later published by Giovanni Battista Ramusio as Descrittione dell'Africa (Description of Africa) in 1550, centered on the geography of the Maghreb and Nile Valley. The book was regarded among his scholarly peers in Europe as the most authoritative treatise on the subject until the modern exploration of Africa. For this work, Leo became a household name among European geographers. He converted from Islam to Christianity and changed his name to Johannes Leo de Medicis (يوحنا الأسد). Most of what is known about his life is gathered from autobiographical notes in his own work. Leo Africanus was born as al-Hasan, son of Muhammad in Granada around the year 1494. The year of birth can be estimated from his self-reported age at the time of various historical events. His family moved to Fez soon after his birth. In Fez he studied at the University of al-Qarawiyyin (also spelled al-Karaouine). As a young man he accompanied an uncle on a diplomatic mission, reaching as far as the city of Timbuktu (1510), then part of the Songhai Empire. In 1517 when returning from a diplomatic mission to Constantinople on behalf of the Sultan of Fez Muhammad II he found himself in the port of Rosetta during the Ottoman conquest of Egypt. He continued with his journey through Cairo and Aswan and across the Red Sea to Arabia, where he probably performed a to Mecca. On his way back to Tunis in 1518 he was captured by Spanish corsairs either near the island of Djerba or more probably near Crete, and imprisoned on the island of Rhodes, the headquarters of the Knights Hospitaller. The usual fate of unransomed Muslim captives was slavery in Christian galleys, but when his captors realized his intelligence and importance, he was moved to the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome and presented to Pope Leo X. He was soon freed and given a pension to persuade him to stay.