Arrange the following travelers from various countries to India, in order of the century of their visit, beginning with the earliest to the most recent.
(A) Marco Polo (Italy)
(B) Al-Biruni (Uzbekistan)
(C) Francois Bernier (France)
(D) Ibn Battuta (Morocco)
Choose the correct answer from the options given below:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → (B), (A), (D), (C)
Each traveller is placed by the century in which he came to India.
(B) Al-Biruni (Uzbekistan) — 11th century. A scholar from Khwarizm, he came to India in the wake of Mahmud of Ghazni’s campaigns and wrote the Kitab-ul-Hind in Arabic.
(A) Marco Polo (Italy) — 13th century. On his way home from China, around 1292-93, he visited the Malabar and Coromandel coasts of South India.
(D) Ibn Battuta (Morocco) — 14th century. He reached India in 1333, served Sultan Muhammad bin Tughlaq as the qazi (judge) of Delhi, and described India in his travel book, the Rihla.
(C) Francois Bernier (France) — 17th century. A French physician, he lived in Mughal India from 1656 to 1668 and wrote Travels in the Mogul Empire.