Ibn Battuta: A Journey from Tangier to China, 1325–1346

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11 October, 2026

The Journey 

In 1325, a young Moroccan scholar named Ibn Battuta left his home city of Tangier to perform the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca. He expected to be away for a limited period. Instead, he travelled for nearly three decades, crossing much of Africa, the Middle East, Central and South Asia, Southeast Asia, and China.

Ibn Battuta was born in Tangier in 1304 and trained in Islamic law. His legal education opened doors at courts and religious institutions across the Islamic world, allowing him to work as a judge, adviser, and envoy as he travelled.

From Pilgrimage to World Journey

He left Tangier on 14 June 1325, travelling through North Africa to Alexandria and Cairo. From Egypt he continued through Jerusalem and Damascus before joining the pilgrim caravan to Medina and Mecca.

After completing his first hajj, Ibn Battuta did not return to Morocco. He travelled east through Iraq and Persia, then sailed and journeyed around the Red Sea, Arabia, and the East African coast. He later crossed Anatolia and the Black Sea region, visited Constantinople, travelled through Central Asia, and reached Delhi in northern India.

India, the Indian Ocean, and China

In Delhi, Ibn Battuta entered the service of Sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq and served as a judge. He was later sent toward China as the sultan’s envoy, but the journey was disrupted by an attack on his party. Rather than returning home, he continued through the Maldives, Sri Lanka, Bengal, Sumatra, and the Malay world.

In 1345–46 he reached the coast of China, visiting Guangzhou and Quanzhou, the major port known in Arabic sources as Zaytun. His return route brought him through a Middle East devastated by the Black Death before he finally reached Tangier in 1349.

The Rihla

After returning to Morocco, Ibn Battuta was instructed by the Marinid ruler to dictate an account of his travels. The resulting book, commonly called the Rihla, was compiled with the scholar Ibn Juzayy and completed in the mid-1350s.

The Rihla describes a journey of approximately 120,000 kilometres, or 75,000 miles, through more than 40 present-day countries. It remains a major source for the social, political, and cultural history of the 14th-century Islamic world, although it must be read critically because it was dictated from memory and shaped for a court audience. 

GIS Route Data

The route is organised as six ordered polylines, one for each major phase of travel. Coordinates are WGS 84 decimal degrees (EPSG:4326). Points should be connected in point_id order within each leg_id. 

Route legs

Leg	Route	Period	Points
1	Tangier to Mecca	1325–26	12
2	Mecca to Iraq, Persia, and return	1326–27	7
3	Arabia, Red Sea, East Africa, and Persian Gulf	1328–30	8
4	Anatolia, Black Sea, Central Asia, and Delhi	1330–34	11
5	India, Maldives, Sri Lanka, and Bengal	1334–45	6
6	Southeast Asia and China	1345–46	8

Waypoint coordinates

ID	Leg	Place	Latitude	Longitude	Role
1	1	Tangier, Morocco	35.7796	-5.8138	Start
2	1	Tlemcen, Algeria	34.8828	-1.3167	Waypoint
3	1	Tunis, Tunisia	36.8065	10.1815	Waypoint
4	1	Tripoli, Libya	32.8872	13.1913	Waypoint
5	1	Alexandria, Egypt	31.2001	29.9187	Port
6	1	Cairo, Egypt	30.0444	31.2357	Major stop
7	1	Gaza, Palestine	31.5017	34.4668	Waypoint
8	1	Hebron, Palestine	31.5326	35.0998	Waypoint
9	1	Jerusalem, Palestine	31.7683	35.2137	Major stop
10	1	Damascus, Syria	33.5138	36.2765	Major stop
11	1	Medina, Saudi Arabia	24.5247	39.5692	Major stop
12	1	Mecca, Saudi Arabia	21.3891	39.8579	Hajj destination
13	2	Mecca, Saudi Arabia	21.3891	39.8579	Start
14	2	Najaf, Iraq	32.0286	44.3206	Waypoint
15	2	Baghdad, Iraq	33.3152	44.3661	Major stop
16	2	Mosul, Iraq	36.3350	43.1189	Waypoint
17	2	Tabriz, Iran	38.0800	46.2919	Major stop
18	2	Basra, Iraq	30.5081	47.7835	Port
19	2	Mecca, Saudi Arabia	21.3891	39.8579	Return
20	3	Mecca, Saudi Arabia	21.3891	39.8579	Start
21	3	Jeddah, Saudi Arabia	21.4858	39.1925	Port
22	3	Aden, Yemen	12.7889	45.0367	Port
23	3	Mogadishu, Somalia	2.0469	45.3182	Port
24	3	Mombasa, Kenya	-4.0435	39.6682	Port
25	3	Kilwa Kisiwani, Tanzania	-8.9650	39.5050	Port
26	3	Muscat, Oman	23.5880	58.3829	Port
27	3	Hormuz / Persian Gulf	26.6500	56.2500	Region waypoint
28	3	Mecca, Saudi Arabia	21.3891	39.8579	Return
29	4	Mecca, Saudi Arabia	21.3891	39.8579	Start
30	4	Jeddah, Saudi Arabia	21.4858	39.1925	Port
31	4	Antalya, Turkey	36.8969	30.7133	Port
32	4	Sinop, Turkey	42.0231	35.1531	Port
33	4	Crimea / Solkhat	45.1000	34.4000	Region waypoint
34	4	Astrakhan, Russia	46.3497	48.0408	Waypoint
35	4	Constantinople, Turkey	41.0082	28.9784	Major stop
36	4	Bukhara, Uzbekistan	39.7747	64.4286	Major stop
37	4	Samarkand, Uzbekistan	39.6270	66.9750	Major stop
38	4	Balkh, Afghanistan	36.7564	66.8972	Waypoint
39	4	Kabul, Afghanistan	34.5553	69.2075	Waypoint
40	4	Delhi, India	28.6139	77.2090	Major stop
40	5	Delhi, India	28.6139	77.2090	Start
41	5	Daulatabad, India	19.9400	75.2200	Waypoint
42	5	Kozhikode / Calicut, India	11.2588	75.7804	Port
43	5	Malé, Maldives	4.1755	73.5093	Major stop
44	5	Colombo / Ceylon, Sri Lanka	6.9271	79.8612	Port
45	5	Sonargaon, Bengal	23.6439	90.6019	Region waypoint
46	6	Chittagong, Bangladesh	22.3569	91.7832	Start
47	6	Samudera Pasai, Sumatra, Indonesia	5.5292	95.3250	Port
48	6	Malacca Strait	2.5000	101.5000	Sea passage
49	6	Champa, central Vietnam	13.7800	109.2200	Port
50	6	Guangzhou, China	23.1291	113.2644	Port
51	6	Quanzhou / Zaytun, China	24.8741	118.6757	Major stop
52	6	Hangzhou, China	30.2741	120.1551	Major stop
53	6	Beijing / Khanbaliq, China	39.9042	116.4074	Major stop

Mapping notes

• Coordinate system: WGS 84, EPSG:4326.
• Line grouping: Use leg_id to create six separate polyline features.
• Point order: Connect waypoints in ascending point_id order.
• Major stops: Cairo, Mecca, Baghdad, Tabriz, Constantinople, Delhi, Malé, Quanzhou, and Beijing.
• Interpretive segments: Sea passages and regional waypoints—especially in East Africa, Southeast Asia, and China—represent probable or generalised routes rather than precisely documented tracks.
  
• End note: This route ends at Ibn Battuta’s China journey in 1346; his later return through the plague-stricken Middle East and his Saharan journey to Mali are historically important but belong to separate mapping phases.
  

Sources: ORIAS, University of California Berkeley, The Journey; Encyclopaedia Britannica, Ibn Battuta; Fordham Medieval Sourcebook, Ibn Battuta’s Travels.