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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 June 2011
Ibn Jubayr, a twelfth-century Muslim pilgrim and traveller from Andalusia, left Acre on 18 October 1184 on a Genoese ship bound for Messina. Of his departure he wrote that:
Our stay there [at Acre] was prolonged twelve days, through the failure of the wind to rise. The blowing of the winds in these parts has a singular secret. It is that the east wind does not blow except in spring and autumn, and, save at those seasons, no voyages can be made and merchants will not bring their goods to Acre. The spring voyages begin in the middle of April, when the east wind blows until the end of May … The autumn voyages are from the middle of October, when the east wind (again) sets in motion … it blows for (only) fifteen days, more or less. There is no other suitable time, for the winds then vary, that from the west prevailing… at daybreak of … the 18th of October the ship set sail… Steadily, we sailed on, under a propitious wind of varying force, for five days. Then the west wind came out of ambuscade and blew into the ship's bows. […]
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