Mohmmad Reza Gholizadeh

The Books of wonders are one of the important genres in the descriptive literature of the Islamic period, which from the perspective of some researchers are considered an independent genre and from the perspective of others, an extension of geographical and historical texts. These texts reflect the efforts of human thought to understand and explain unknown or amazing phenomena in the context of the observable and subjective world. Although the roots of the formation of ajaibnama are not limited to the Islamic world and its links with the scientific and mythical traditions of civilizations such as ancient Greece can be identified, in the Islamic period, these texts found a deep connection with descriptive geography. The authors of ajaibnama tried to provide a meaningful understanding of the unknown world by combining empirical data, scientific sources and imaginative elements. This article aims to analyze the position of the concept of "strange" in these texts, examining part of the content of the "Ajaibnama" (Books of Wonders), focusing on marine wonders, and shows how, over time, these works have acquired a function beyond entertainment and have become a means of transmitting knowledge, culture, and cosmic attitudes in previous societies.