Omar ibn Said

Born around 1770 in Futa Toro, in what is now Senegal, he was educated as a Muslim scholar and spent many years studying Islam before being captured and sold into slavery. In 1807 he was transported to the United States, where he was eventually enslaved in North Carolina.

He is best known for writing an autobiography in Arabic in 1831, making him one of the few enslaved people in the United States to leave a life narrative in that language. His surviving writings, which also include religious texts and reflections, have become important documents for understanding both African Muslim history and the lived experience of slavery in America.

Although he spent the rest of his life in bondage, his work endures as a powerful witness to memory, belief, and intellectual life under oppression. He died in the 1860s; some sources give 1864, though the date is sometimes listed nearby as 1863.