Ahmed ibn Fadlan’s Encounter with a Giant man from Yajuj and Majuj (Gog & Magog)

 This passage is from Ahmed ibn Fadlan's Risala:

Tekin had told me that in the king’s country there was a giant of a man. When I arrived in the town, I asked the king about him.
He said, “Yes, he was in our country, and he has died. He was neither from this town nor one of our people.

“His story is this: a group of merchants traveled out to the Volga River. It is a river that takes a whole day’s journey to reach, and it had risen and overflowed its banks. One day, a group of merchants came to me and said, ‘O king, a man has appeared by the river. If he belongs to a nation near us, then there is no place left for us in this land, and we will have no choice but to move elsewhere.’

“So I rode with them to the river until we reached it, and there I saw a man. His arm was twelve cubits long, his head was like a large pot, his nose was more than a span in length, and he had huge eyes and fingers that were also more than a span. His appearance terrified us, and we were afraid of him. We tried speaking to him, but he did not answer; he only looked at us.

“I had him brought to my dwelling, and I wrote to the people of Wisu—who live three months’ journey from us—asking about him. They wrote back to inform me that this man was one of Gog and Magog, who live three months' journey beyond them. They live naked, and a sea lies between us, for they dwell on its shore. They mate like animals. Each day, God Almighty brings forth a fish from the sea for them. Each man comes with a knife and cuts from the fish only as much as is sufficient for him and his dependents. If he takes more than he needs, his stomach aches, and so do the stomachs of his dependents, and they may all die. Once they take what they need, the fish turns over and sinks back into the sea. They do the same every day.

“Between us and them lies the sea on one side and mountains surrounding them on the other. The barrier also blocks the gate through which they used to come out. But when God Almighty wills to release them upon the people and the inhabited lands, He will allow them to breach the barrier, cause the sea to dry up, and cease providing them with the fish.”

I then asked him about the man’s fate. He said, “He stayed with me for a while. Any boy who looked at him died, and any pregnant woman who looked at him miscarried. If he caught a person, he would squeeze him with his hands until he killed him. When I saw what he was doing, I hanged him from a tall tree until he died. If you wish to see his bones and his skull, I will go with you and help you find them.”

I said, “By Allah, I would indeed like to do that.” So he rode with me to a vast place filled with great, tall trees, and he led me to a tree under which the man’s bones and skull had fallen. I saw his skull—it was like a large beehive—and his ribs were larger than the stalks of palm trees, as were the bones of his arms and legs. I marveled at him, and then I left.