Zhao Rukuo

Zhao Rukuo (born 1170, Zhejiang province, China—died September 1231) was a Chinese trade official whose two-volume work Zhufan zhi (“Description of the Barbarians”) is one of the best-known and most wide-ranging accounts of foreign places and goods at the time of the Song dynasty (960–1279). Zhao was a member of the Song imperial family and once held the position of superintendent of customs at the great port of Quanzhou in Fujian province in southern China....