Voyage El Youssi (1690-1691)
| The book is an essential reference in travel literature for it is a creative work which, rather than merely narrating a biography, documents historical events and their political, economic and social dimensions. In this context, the author shows that there was a large number of pilgrimage journeys by land from the Maghreb because of the struggle on the region’s coasts between Spain and the Ottoman Empire for control of the Strait of Sicily. For this reason, Al Youssi’s Journey (1690-1691) is a scholarly historical source for researchers, historians, anthropologists, political scientists, etc. Indeed, it is a document full of facts, bringing together the geographical information that one might find in a tourist guide and historical data, for it documents events. As a result, the editor, Ahmed Al Behi, considers it as illustrative of one of the most important literary forms characteristic of the Maghreb region since the Middle Ages, stating on this count: “this book is an important link in the chain of journeys to Mecca and Al Hijaz documented by people from the Maghreb as they fulfilled their Pilgrimage duty or traveled in pursuit of knowledge.” |
