Arab navigation in the Indian Ocean before the coming of the Portuguese : being a translation of Kitāb al-Fawāʼid fī uṣūl al-baḥr waʼl-qawāʼid of Aḥmad b. Mājid al-Najdī ; together with an introduction on the history of Arab navigation, notes on the navig

Being a translation of Kitāb al-Fawāʼid fī uṣūl al-baḥr waʼl-qawāʼid of Aḥmad b. Mājid al-Najdī ; together with an introduction on the history of Arab navigation, notes on the navigational techniques and on the topography of the Indian Ocean and a glossary of navigational terms. With maps and charts.Aḥmad ibn Mājid (Arabic: أحمد بن ماجد), known as "Amīr al-Baḥr al-ʿArabī" in Arabic (Arabic: أمير البحر العربي), “Prince of the Sea” and known also as the Lion of the Sea, was an Arab navigator and cartographer born c. 1432 in Julfar, (present-day Ras Al Khaimah, United Arab Emirates). He was raised in a family famous for seafaring; at the age of seventeen he was able to navigate ships. The exact date is not known, but Ibn Mājid probably died around 1500. Although long identified in the West as the navigator who helped Vasco da Gama find his way from Africa to India, contemporary research has shown Ibn Mājid is unlikely even to have met Da Gama. Ibn Mājid was the author of nearly forty works of poetry and prose.