China according to Muslim Travelers: First to Eighth Century AH

Muslim’s relationships with China have a very long background. These relationships have been established through Muslims’ journeys to that region for various commercial, economic, political, and religious motives. Available evidence suggests that Muslims travelled to this land when the first signs of cultural and political life appeared there. As a result of these journeys, Muslim geographers have accumulated some valuable information in various areas such as natural geography, including the geographical realm of China, its cities, and the distances between them, and economic, cultural, and educational fields, including artistic, scientific, social, and industrial achievements. This paper intends to explore and analyze the picture of China as portrayed and described by Muslims from the first century AH until the time of Hafiz Abru in the eighth century. As a result, it can function as an introduction to and an analysis of Islamic orientalism in which the reports of scientists and travelers of a great political and cultural power in the Far East form the basis of journeys, relationships, and wars between countries and the transfer of philosophical and cultural legacies from one place to another. The writer believes that the importance of these reports and descriptions lies in the fact that they have been at the service of expanding Islamic culture and religion.