Ibn Amira

Who is Ibn Amira?

Ibn Amira or Ahmad ibn Abd Allah Ibn Amira was a historian, poet, and scholar of law from al-Andalus during the reign of the Almohad dynasty. Ibn Amira was Qadi of Mallorca and worked for the Almohad sultan in Valencia and Sevilla and moved to Morocco in 1239/40 and continued to work for the sultan there.

The theme of paradise lost was expressed by the Valencian exile in his 'Letter to a Friend'. This friend was the poet Ibn al-Abbar.: "An ocean of sadness rages inside us, Our hearts, desperate, burn with eternal flames. The city was so beautiful with its gardens and rivers, The nights were imbued with the sweet fragrance of narcissus."

Ibn Amira is also the author of a manuscript about the history of Mallorca, Tarij Mayurqa. The manuscript is translated into Spanish by the historian Guillem Rosselló Bordoy.