Rashid-al-Din Hamadani

Rashid-al-Din Hamadani

Rashīd al-Dīn Tabīb (Persian: رشیدالدین طبیب‎) also Rashīd al-Dīn Fadhl-allāh Hamadānī (1247–1318) (Persian: رشیدالدین فضل‌الله همدانی‎), was a Persian physician of Jewish origin, polymathic writer and historian, who wrote an enormous Islamic history, the Jami al-Tawarikh, in the Persian language, often considered a landmark in intercultural historiography and a key document on the Ilkhanids (13th and 14th century). In 1980, an illuminated version of this manuscript in Arabic was sold at Sotheby's to Nasser David Khalili for £850,000, the then highest price ever paid for an Arabic manuscript.

His encyclopedic knowledge of a wide range of cultures from Mongolia to China to the Steppes of Central Eurasia to Persia, the Arab lands, and Europe, provide the most direct access to information on the late Mongol era. His descriptions also highlight the manner in which the Mongol Empire and its emphasis on trade resulted in an atmosphere of cultural and religious exchange and intellectual ferment, resulting in the transmission of a host of ideas from East to West and vice versa. Historian Morris Rossabi calls Rashid-al-Din "arguably the most distinguished figure in Persia during Mongolian rule".