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Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Khwarizmi

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Not to be confused with Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī.

Muḥammad ibn al-ʿAbbās Abū Bakr al-Khwārazmī, better simply known as Abu Bakr al-Khwarazmi was a 10th-century Iranian poet and secretary, who throughout his long career served in the court of the Hamdanids, Samanids, Saffarids and Buyids.[1] He is best known as the author of the early encyclopedia Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm (“Key to the Sciences”) in the Arabic language.

Life

Al-Khwarazmi is a somewhat obscure figure.[2] He was born in 935 in Khwarazm, the birthplace of his father. His mother was a native of Amol in Tabaristan.[1] He periodically refers to himself as al-Khwarazmi or al-Tabari, while other sources refer to him as al-Tabarkhazmi or al-Tabarkhazi.[1] Al-Khwarizmi may have been a nephew of al-Tabari, the prominent Persian historian.[1] For a time, al-Khwarizmi worked as a clerk in the Samanid court at Bukhara in Transoxania,[2][3] where he acquired his nickname, “al-Katib’’ which literally means “the secretary” or “the scribe”.[4]

While at the Samanid court, he compiled his best-known work, Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm [The Keys of the Sciences], an early Islamic encyclopedia of the sciences, intended as a reference work for court officials. It was produced at the request of Abū l-Ḥasan al-ʿUtbī a vizier in the court of Amir, Nuh II.[5][6] and the work is dedicated to al-Utbi which establishes a date for its completion of around 977.[7][2] In Nishapur, Al-Khwarizmi wrote a number of rihla (short, humorous accounts of a journey; partly written in verse and partly in literary prose), of which only fragments survive.[8] Locally, he achieved great fame as a leading scholar and writer. However, his reputation was eclipsed following the arrival of an aspiring young scholar and writer, Badi' al-Zaman al-Hamadani in 383/992. Hamadani composed a new form of prose that gained enormous popularity firstly in Nishapur and later across the Arabic speaking world. This innovative genre that became known as maqama. Al-Khwārizmīand Hamadani fell into competition with each other, exchanged insults and they eventually fell out.[9]

Work

Al-Khwārizmī authored a work on Arabic grammar, Kitāb kifāyat al-Mutaḥaffiẓ [A Classified Vocabulary of Rare of Difficult Arabic words]. However, he is best known as the author of Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm (The Keys to the Sciences), an early Islamic Encyclopedia of the Sciences.[10] A monumental work, Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm is part lexicography and part encyclopedia.[11] Scholars regard it as the first attempt to document the Islamic sciences.[12] The work includes sections on mathematics, alchemy, medicine and meteorology.[13]

Editions and Translations

Only limited selections of Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm have been translated into English. Notable editions and translations include:

  • Gerlog van Volten (ed), Kitāb Liber Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm, Leiden, Brill, 1895 (in Arabic, with an introduction in Latin)- many reprints.
  • Al-Khashshāb, Y. and al-ʻArīnī, B., ‏ضبط وتحقيق الالفاظ الإستلهية التنخية الواردة فى كتاب مفاتبح العلوم للخورزم / /ليحيى الخشاب، الباز العريني. [Ḍabṭ wa-taḥqīq al-alfāẓ al-istilahiyah al-tankhiyah al-wāridah fī kitāb Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm lil-Khuwarizmi] Controlling and realizing the developmental vocabulary contained in the book of Mufatih, Cairo, 1958 (Arabic)
  • Khadivjam, H., Tarjumah-ʼi Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm, Tehran, Markaz-i Intishārāt-i ʻIlmī va Farhangī, 1983 (in Persian and Arabic).
  • Al-Ibyari, I., Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm, Beirut, 1984
  • Bosworth, C.E.,“Abū ʿAbdallāh al-Khwārizmīon the Technical Terms of the Secretary’s Art”, Journal of the Social and Economic History of the Orient, vol. 12, pp 112-164 (reprinted in Medieval Arabic Culture, no. 15, London, 1983. - annotated translation of the 4th chapter of Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm (English)
  • Bosworth, C.E. (1977). "AL-ḪWĀRAZMĪ ON THEOLOGY AND SECTS: THE CHAPTER ON KALAM IN THE MAFĀTĪḤ AL-ʿULŪM". Bulletin d'études orientales. 29: 85–95. JSTOR 41604610. OCLC 12768086.
  • Hajudan, H., A Persian Translation of Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm, Tehran, 1928 (in Persian)
  • Farmer, H.G.,”The Science of Music in the Mafatih Alulum” in: Transactions of the Glasgow University Oriental Society, vol. 17, 1957/8, pp 1-9translation of Section 7, Part 2 (English)
  • Unvala, J.M., "The Translation of an Extract from Mafatih aI-Ulum of al-Khwarazmi," The Journal of the K.R. Cama Institute, vol. XI,1928 (English)
  • Seidel, E., "Die Medizin im Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm", SBPMSE, vol. XLVII, 1915, pp 1-79 (in German, with extensive commentary)
  • Weidemann, B., “Über die Geometrie und Arithematik nach den Mafātīḥ al-ʻulūm, ”SBPMSE, vol, 40, 1908, pp 1-64 (German)

References

  1. ^ a b c d Sadeghi & Tehrani 2015.
  2. ^ a b c Bosworth 1977, p. 85.
  3. ^ . doi:10.1163/1877-8054_cmri_COM_22576. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
  4. ^ Willy Hartner, Yasukatsu Maeyama, Walter Gabriel Saltzer, Prismata:Naturwissenschaftsgeschichtl. Studien: Festschrift für Willy Hartner,Steiner, 1977, p. 264
  5. ^ Abdi, W. H (1990). Interaction between Indian and central Asian science and technology in medieval times. Indian National Science Academy. p. 2. OCLC 555654275.
  6. ^ Jam, H.K., The Translation of Mafatih al-'Ulum (ترجمهٔ مفاتیح العلوم), Bonyad-e Farhang-e Iran, 1968, reprinted by Sherkat-e Entesharat-e Elmi o Farhangi, c. 2004
  7. ^ . doi:10.1163/1877-8054_cmri_COM_22577. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
  8. ^ Hämeen-Anttila 2002, p. 147.
  9. ^ Hämeen-Anttila 2002, pp. 21–24.
  10. ^ Bosworth 1963, p. 100.
  11. ^ Thomann, J. (1 January 2015). "On the Natural Sciences: An Arabic Critical Edition and English Translation of EPISTLES 15-21 Edited and translated by C. BAFFIONI". Journal of Islamic Studies. 26 (1): 67–69. doi:10.1093/jis/etu080.
  12. ^ Jabbar Beg, M.A., The Origin of Islamic Science, Religion, p. 17 https://archive.org/details/the_origins_of_islamic_science
  13. ^ Kalin, I. and Ayduz, S. (eds), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in Islam, Volume 1, Oxford University Press, 2014,p. 100; Jabbar Beg, M.A., The Origin of Islamic Science, https://archive.org/details/the_origins_of_islamic_sciencep. 50.

Sources

Further reading

  • J. Vernet, "Al-Khuwārizmī, Abū ‘Abd Allāh Muḥammad Ibn Aḥmad Ibn Yūsuf", Dictionary of Scientific Biography.
  • Hossein Khadiv Jam, The Translation of Mafatih al-'Ulum (Template:Lang-fa), Bonyad-e Farhang-e Iran, 1347 AP (1968), reprinted by Sherkat-e Entesharat-e Elmi-o Farhangi, 1383 AP (c. 2004 CE).
  • Bosworth, C. E. (1963). "A Pioneer Arabic Encyclopedia of the Sciences: Al Khwarizmi's Keys of the Sciences". Isis. 54 (1): 97–111. JSTOR 228730.
  • Bosworth, C. E.; Clauson, Gerard (1965). "Al-Xwārazmī on the Peoples of Central Asia". The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1/2): 2–12. JSTOR 25202803.
  • Gerlof van Vloten, the editor of Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm 1895 publication in Leiden, mentions in a preface to Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm that nothing is known about al-Khwārizmī except his name and that he is also known as al-Balkhi, but Hossein Khadiv Jam, the Persian translator of Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm mentions that after a lot of searches he has found that al-Khwārizmī "was born in Balkh, lived in Nishapur, worked as a clerk in the Samanid court for a while, and has authored the book Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm, one of the oldest Islamic encyclopedias, at the request of Abu'l-Husain Utbi, a vizier of Nuh II, in the Arabic language."
  • Hämeen-Anttila, Jaakko (2002). Maqama: A History of a Genre. Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. ISBN 978-3-447-04591-9.
  • Bosworth, C. E.; Clauson, Gerard (1965). "Al-Xwārazmī on the Peoples of Central Asia". The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1/2): 2–12. JSTOR 25202803.
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