biography
| name: |
Leo Africanus
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originally Alhassan ibn Mohammed Alwazzan
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (c.1485–c.1554)
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| biography:
| Traveller and geographer, born in Granada, S Spain. He studied at Fés in Morocco, and travelled in N Africa and Asia Minor on commercial and diplomatic missions. Falling into the hands of Venetian corsairs, he was sent to Pope Leo X in Rome, where he lived for 20 years, and accepted Christianity, but later returned to Africa. He wrote Descrittione dell'Africa (1550, trans A Geographical Historie of Africa), and for some 400 years it was the chief source of information about Islam. |
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