Léon l'Africain

Leo Africanus (French: Léon l'Africain) is a 1986 novel by Amin Maalouf, written in the form of a memoir, depicting the life of the eponymous Renaissance-era traveler, Leo Africanus. Since very little is actually known about the life of Leo, the book fills in the historical episodes, placing him in the company of many of the key historical—political and cultural—figures of his time, including Popes Leo X, Adrian VI, and Clement VII; Ottoman emperors Selim I and Suleiman the Magnificent; Boabdil, the last Moorish king of Granada; Askia Mohammad I of the Songhai Empire; Ferdinand of Spain; Francis I of France; and artist Raphael along with others. Leo Africanus is Maalouf's first novel and has received high praise. The work explores confrontations between Islam and Christianity as well as the mutual influence that the two religions had on each other and on the people they governed.