Wikipedia
Al-Masudi
Al-Mas‘udi (, ; –956) was an Arab historian and geographer. He is sometimes referred to as the Herodotus of the Arabs. Al-Mas‘udi was one of the first to combine history and scientific geography in a large-scale work, The Meadows of Gold and Mines of Gems (, Muruj adh-dhahab wa ma'adin al-jawhar), a world history.