ABSTRACT
I DUARTE BARBOSA, a gentleman of the right noble city of Lisbon, having sailed for a great part of my youth over the seas of India, discovered in the name of His Majesty the King our Lord, and having travelled by land as well through many and divers regions lying in the neighbourhood thereof, and having seen and heard in that time many things which I esteemed marvellous and astonishing inasmuch that they had never been seen or heard by our forefathers, have resolved to write them down for the profit of all men, even as I saw them or understood them day by day, endeavouring to set forth in this my book the towns and the bounds of all those kingdoms where I have either been myself or as to which I have learnt from trustworthy persons, stating which are the kingdoms of the Moors and which of the Heathen, and the customs thereof.
