Ibn Fadlallah al-Umari

Shihāb al-Dīn Abū al-‘Abbās Aḥmad b. Faḍl Allāh al-'Umarī (شهاب الدين أبو العبّاس أحمد بن فضل الله العمري), or simply al-‘Umarī, (1300 – 1349) was an Arab historian, born in Damascus.^[1] al-Umari visited Cairo shortly after the Malian Mansa Kankan Musa I's pilgrimage to Mecca, and his writings are one of the primary sources for this legendary hajj. In particular, al-Umari recorded that the Mansa dispensed so much gold that its value fell in Egypt for a decade afterward, a story that is often repeated in describing the wealth of the Mali Empire.^[2]

al-Umari also recorded Kankan Musa's stories of the previous mansa; Kankan Musa claimed that the previous ruler had abdicated the throne to journey to a land across the ocean, leading contemporary Malian historian Gaoussou Diawara to theorize that Abubakari reached the Americas years before Christopher Columbus. Some of his work can be found in the Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History.

His works also provide a basis for the Muslim side on the wars of Amda Seyon I against Ifat, Adal, and other regions.