The Zoroastrian myth of migration from Iran and settlement in the Indian diaspora : text, translation and analysis of the 16th century Qeṣṣe-ye Sanjān 'The story of Sanjan' /
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The Qesse-ye Sanjān is the sole surviving account of the emigration of Zoroastrians from Iran to India to form the Parsi ('Persian') community. Written in Persian couplets in India in 1599 by a Zoroastrian priest, it is a work many know of, but few have actually read, let alone studied in depth. This book provides a romanised transcription from the oldest manuscripts, an elegant metrical translation, detailed commentary and, most importantly, a radical new theory of how such a text should be "read", id est not as a historical chronical but as a charter of Zoroastrian identity, foundation myth and justification of the Parsi presence in India. The book fills a lacuna that has been acutely felt for a long time.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [239]-242) and indexes. :
9789047430421 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Jahān-i dānish /
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Sharaf al-Din Mas'ūdi (6th/12th cent.) was a philosopher, astronomer, mathematician and logician. A native of Marw, he spent a large part of his life in Bukhara and Samarqand, Transoxiana. In Bukhara he had a number of debates with the philosopher and theologian Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī (d. 606/1210), described in the latter's Munāẓarāt jarat fī bilād Mā warāʾ al-nahr . From among his philosophical works, his critical notes to Avicenna's (d. 428/1037) al-Ishārāt wal-tanbīhāt deserve special mention. In the sciences, he wrote a work on astronomy and geography called al-Kifāya fī ʿilm al-hayʾa . In the introduction to this work he explains that he composed it at the request of a friend and that it is based on the works of others, among then Ibn al-Haytham (d. ca. 432/1040-41) and Kushyār b. Labbān (fl. late 4th/10th cent.). Afterwards, he translated it into Persian-this time without mentioning his sources-calling it Jahāni- dānish , published in this volume.
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1 online resource. :
9789004403383
9789646781764
Pizhūhishhāʾī dar tārīkh-i ʿilm : Maqālātī dar bāra-yi tārīkh-i riyāḍiyyāt, nujūm, mikānīk, wa pizishkī /
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As is well known, large parts of the Greek sciences were assimilated by the medieval Muslim world. Equally well known is the fact that quite a number of Muslim scholars contributed to the further development of some of these sciences and also, that some of their works were translated into Latin and other western languages, leaving their imprint on late medieval and early modern science in turn. For this reason, anyone interested in the history of science in the western world will be interested in reading about the history of science in Islam and vice versa. This is why the editor of the present collection of articles has done well to bring together contributions from both fields, in French, English, and Persian. While all of these articles are interesting in their own right, the section dedicated to Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274) and a study of Descartes' (d. 1650) de Solidorum elementis deserve special mention.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405813
9786002030184
Kitāb talkhīṣ al-Muḥaṣṣal : fī sharḥ al-Muḥaṣṣal fī ʿilm al-kalām /
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Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī (d. 606/1210) was a prominent theologian, interpreter of the Qurʾān and philosopher. He was born in Rayy where he studied theology, philosophy and law under different masters, including his father, a preacher. After his studies, he started a wandering life which took him to different cities and courts in Transoxania and Khwārazm. He finally settled in Herat where he spent the rest of his life, a wealthy and respected scholar and author of a number of seminal works. Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274) was an influential philosopher, theologian, mathematician and astronomer, besides being the first director of the famous observatory at Marāghah near Tabriz as well as a man of politics. Author of a large number of scholarly works, his influential commentary on Rāzī's Muḥaṣṣal on philosophical theology is a critical appraisal of a work which Ṭūsī considered much overrated. Facsimile of the oldest known copy, dated 669/1270.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406650
9786002031006
Tuḥfat al-azhār wa-zulāl al-anhār. Volume 2 : Fī nasab abnāʾ al-aʾimma al-aṭhār ʿalayhim ṣalawāt al-malik al-ghaffār /
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In traditional societies, ancestry is an important organising principle, often determining the lives of individuals or groups from the moment that they are born. In the Arab world, nasab (pl. ansāb ) or lineage was and to some extent still is, a major factor in the distribution of wordly and religious power, while administrative positions, trades, crafts and certain offices in the world of scholarship, too, often devolved along hereditary lines. Among the Shīʿa, where blood ties with the family of the Prophet through ʿAlī and his descendants are highly regarded and a source of authority and social standing, we find a number of ansāb works that focus exclusively on the genealogy of the twelve imams. Born into a Shīʿite family of ansāb scholars in 11th/17th-century Medina, the author of the present work travelled extensively in the Shīʿa world in his search for information. The result is a voluminous work, rich in material, genealogical and historic. 3 vols. & supplement al-Rawḍ al-miʿṭār fī tashjīr Tuḥfat al-azhār ; volume 2.
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1 online resource. :
9789004402553
9789646781115
Akhbār wulāt Khurāsān /
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The present work is not an historical text in the regular sense of the word. It is rather an inventory of as many citations and borrowings in later sources as possible from a text now lost. Written in Arabic, the Akhbār wulāt Khurāsān was started by ʿAbd al-Ḥusayn b. Aḥmad al-Sallāmi (d. 300/912) of Khwār near Bayhaq, whose account ran to the year 289/902, and then continued by his brother Abū ʿAlī b. Aḥmad al-Sallāmī, finishing in the year 344/955. As stated by the author of the present compilation, the work is important in that it is an early history of the governors of Khurāsān which was not written from religious or political motives. A trusted source, it saw at least three abridgements and is cited or used by many later authors, among them Abū Rayḥān Bīrūnī (d. 440/1048), ʿIzz al-Dīn b. al-Athīr (d. 630/1233), and ʿAbd al-Ḥayy b. Ḍaḥḥāk Gardīzī (fl. middle 5th/11th century)
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1 online resource. :
9789004405806
9786002030177
Sharḥ al-Muqaddama fi ʼl-kalām : maʿa ʼl-Muqaddama fi ʼl-kalām, nuskha muṣawwara min majmūʿat ʿĀṭif Efendī raqm 1338/1 /
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The Imāmī scholar Abū Jaʿfar Ṭūsī (d. 459-60/1066-7) was born in Ṭūs in Khurāsān. Having completed his basic education there, he left for Baghdad, which at the time was ruled by the Shīʿī Buwayhid dynasty. In Baghdad he attended the classes of various prominent scholars, notably the leading Imāmī rationalist of his time, al-Shaykh al-Mufīd (d. 413/1022) and his successor al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044). After the death of al-Murtaḍā, Ṭūsī, who had already made a name for himself as a thinker and a writer, became the undisputed leader of the Imāmī community. About ten years later Baghdad was invaded by the Saljuqs and Ṭūsī's house and libraries were laid to waste. Tūsī fled to Najaf where he remained until his death. Al-Muqaddima fi ʼl-kalām on concepts in theology figures among Ṭūsī's most important works. The commentary by Najīb al-Dīn al-Ḥusaynī (d. 582/1186) printed in facsimile here are lecture notes, made by one of his students.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406230
9786002030658
Minhāj al-wilāya fī sharḥ Nahj al-balāgha. Volume 1 /
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The Nahj al-balāgha is a collection of sermons, letters, testimonials, and wise sayings attributed to ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib (d. 40/661), the Prophet's son-in-law, successor, and first imam of the Shīʿa. The collection was compiled by al-Sharīf al-Raḍī (d. 406/1088), a distinguished ʿAlid member of Baghdad's ruling elite. The Nahj al-balāgha is widely considered as a work of extraordinary literary quality, besides being an invaluable source of information on the person, opinions, and virtues of ʿAlī. Many commentaries on it were written, in Arabic and in Persian. The present, two-volume Persian commentary was written by ʿAbd al-Bāqī Ṣūfī Tabrīzī (d. 1039/1629-30), who spent most of his active life in then-Ottoman Baghdad, mystics mostly having a hard time under the Safavid ruler Shāh ʿAbbās I (r. 1587-1629). The commentary is thematically organized into twelve sections and explains the text from a variety of angles, with discussions ranging from theology and tradition to philosophy and mysticism. 2 vols; volume 1.
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1 online resource. :
9789004402492
9789646781184
Āthār-i Fatḥallāh Khān-i Shaybānī. Volume 1 : Jild-i avval Dīwān-i ashʿār, Fatḥ u ẓafar /
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Fatḥallāh Khān Shaybānī (d. 1308/1891) was a major poet of the Qajar era who belonged to the so-called 'return' movement, which wanted to break free from the Sabk-i Hindī or 'Indian style' in poetry, that was popular in Iran since Safavid times. Shaybānī was born in a suburb of Kashan around 1241/1825. Having completed his education there and thanks to his father's connections, he became a companion of the future Nāṣir al-Dīn Shāh Qājār (r. 1264-1313/1848-96). However, due to courtly intrigues he was soon expelled, an expulsion which would last a full 35 years before relations were restored. In that period he served in various official capacities, lastly as the governor of Mashhad. Between assigments, he lived in the countryside near Natanz for around 25 years. Shaybānī's work, here published in full, is characterized by an aversion of undue embellishments, his choice of subjects, his criticism of politics and society, and his concrete suggestions for change. 2 vols; volume 1.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406384
9786002030870
ʿArafāt al-ʿāshiqīn wa-ʿaraṣāt al-ʿārifīn. Volume 5, ʿAyn-Fāʾ /
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In Persian literature, tadhkira ('note', 'memorandum') works are for the most part collections of biographies of poets, combined with selections from their writings. The earliest such work is Dawlatshāh Samarqandī's Tadhkirat al-shuʿarāʾ (completed in 892/1487), which set a standard for posterity. The tadhkira genre was especially popular in the 10th/16th century and following. The present work by Taqī al-Dīn Awḥadī (alive in 1042/1632-33) is a good example of this. Born in Isfahan in 973/1565, as a young man his poetical talent was commended by, among others, the poet ʿUrfī Shīrāzī (d. 999/1591). After some time in the entourage of Shāh ʿAbbās I and a six-year stay in Iraq, he left Persia to try his luck at one of the courts in India. The present work, completed in 1024/1615, was written for a high official at the court of Jahāngīr. It contains about 3500 entries on Persian poets from the earliest times until his own day.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405547
9789648700848
Fihrist-i nuskhahā-yi khaṭṭi-yi Fārsi-yi Pākistān (Fihrist-i 8000 nuskha-yi khaṭṭi-yi kitābkhānahā-yi shakhṣī va dawlatī). Volume 2 : ʿIrfān etc. /
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This catalogue of Persian manuscripts in Pakistan was compiled by the well-known specialist of Islamic manuscripts ʿĀrif Nawshāhī (1955). It can be seen as a sequel to Aḥmad Munzawī's (d. 2015) 14-volume Fihrist-i mushtarak-i nuskhahā-yi khaṭṭi-yi Fārsi-yi Pākistān (1983-1997), besides Nawshāhī's own catalogues of the Persian manuscripts in the National Archives of Pakistan and the Punjab University Library in Lahore. The catalogue published here contains information on around 8000 manuscripts in 335 collections in Pakistan, mostly in non-government and private libraries, madrasas, and monasteries. In view of the threat of decay of manuscripts in private collections due to poor storage conditions and a declining interest in the Persian language, this catalogue is both a witness and a wake-up call. In this work, Nawshāhī relies on his own research, on notes by others, until then forgotten in the archives of the Iran-Pakistan Institute of Persian Studies in Islamabad, and also on different kinds of published sources. 4 vols; volume 2.
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1 online resource. :
9789004408173
9786002031433
Andīshahā-yi falsafī u kalāmi-yi Khwājah Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī /
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Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274) was an influential philosopher, theologian, mathematician and astronomer, besides being the first director of the famous observatory at Marāghah near Tabriz as well as a man of politics. Author of a large number of scholarly works, he is especially famous for such treatises as his Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād on theology, the Zīj-i Īlkhānī on astronomy, the Ḥall mushkilāt al-Ishārāt , his influential commentary on Avicenna's (428/1037) Kitāb al-ishārāt wal-tanbīhāt on philosophy and logic, and his Akhlāq-i Nāṣirī on ethics. In Iran Ṭūsī stands in high regard and studies on him abound. There are a number of monographs on him in Persian, besides proceedings of various Ṭūsī conferences and numerous articles. It is therefore no surprise that the present work by Hānī Nuʿmān Farḥāt, originally published as Al-Khwāja Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī wa-ārāʾuhu al-falsafiyya wal-kalāmiyya (Beirut, 1406/1986), was translated into Persian. Based mostly on Arabic sources, the work focusses mainly on theology and philosophy.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405677
9789648700640
The expansion of prophetic experience : essays on historicity, contingency and plurality in religion /
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Abdulkarim Soroush is known primarily for his epistemological/hermeneutical theory, the "Contraction and Expansion of Religious Knowledge," and its application to Islamic political theory and religious pluralism. While his Reason, Freedom and Democracy in Islam applies that theory to plurality and the historicity of understanding and interpretation of religion, this book captures some of his original theories about religion itself. The Expansion of Prophetic Experience treats the historicity of the Prophet Muhammad's revelatory experience, including human and contextual influences on the genesis of the sacred Text. It presents substantial aspects of Soroush's Neo-Rationalist hermeneutical project for an Islamic reformed theology and ethics, systematically leading Islamic reformation beyond conventional projects of piecemeal adjustments to the Shariʿah or selective re-interpretations of the Qurʾān.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [345]-348) and index. :
9789047424369 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Kitāb al-tafṣīl li-jumal al-Taḥṣīl : Sharḥ Kitāb al-taḥṣīl li-muʾallifihi Ḥasan b. Muḥammad al-Raṣṣāṣ /
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From the time of its foundation in 284/897, the Zaydī Imamate of Yemen was home to Muʿtazilī ideas. During the first centuries and starting with Imam al-Hādī ila ʼl-Ḥaqq (d. 298/911), Zaydī ideology included elements very much akin to the opinions of the Baghdad School of the Muʿtazila as founded by Bishr b. al-Muʿtamir (d. 210/825). However, in the 6-7th/11-12th centuries, we see a rise in popularity of Bahshamiyya ideas, a sub-group of the Basran School of the Muʿtazila around Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī (d. 321/933). These ideas were systematized and elaborated upon by the Zaydī theologian al-Raṣṣāṣ (d. 584/1188), notably in his short theological summa the Kitāb al-taḥṣīl fi ʼl-tawḥīd wal-taʿdīl . This work soon gained popularity and within 30 years after his death, as three commentaries on it were written. The one whose surviving part is published here is an early witness of Yemeni Zaydī acquaintance with Ibn al-Malāḥimī's (d. 536/1141) works and anti-Bahshamī teachings.
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1 online resource. :
9789004406254
9786002030641
Rawḍat al-munajjimīn /
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In the first centuries of Islam, Arabic gradually replaced Middle Persian to become the language of the new religion and the administration of Iran. Works in Middle Persian were translated into Arabic and Persian authors also started writing directly in Arabic. From the fifth/eleventh century onward, there arose a need for works in New Persian, either translated from Arabic or composed in New Persian straightaway. The work published in this volume is a product of that period. Not much is known about the life of its author, Shahmardān b. Abi ʼl-Khayr. A resident of Gurgān and Astarābād, he was a scholar who also worked as a secretary and financial officer. In astronomy, he was a student of Abu ʼl-Ḥasan Nasawī (fl. 2nd quart. 5th/11th cent.). Shahmardān's work is an accessible, popularized compilation of the works of others, among them Abū Maʿshar (d. 272/886), Kushyār b. Labbān (fl. late 4th/10th cent.), and Bīrūnī (d. 440/1048)
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1 online resource. :
9789004403673
9789646781795
Mathnawi-yi maʿnawī. Volume 2 : mujallad-i duvum daftar-i sivum u chahārum /
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The founder of the Mawlawiyya order of dervishes, Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (d. 672/1273) is the most celebrated and widely quoted mystical poet of the Persianate world. Born in Balkh in 604/1207, he was still a child when his father, a preacher, emigrated westwards with his family, moving to Malaṭya, Sivas, Akshehir, Larende and, finally, Konya. It was in Konya that Rūmī, who had also received a regular education, met the people who would give his life a decisive turn towards mysticism: first, his father's former pupil Sayyid Burhān al-Dīn Muḥaqqiq (d. 637/1239-40) and then, most of all, the celebrated mystic Shams al-Dīn Tabrīzī (d. 645/1247). Rūmī's Mathnawi-yi maʿnawī is a didactic poem inspired by his favourite student Ḥusām al-Dīn Čelebi (d. 683/1284). Composed in six fascicles ( daftar ), it took several years to complete. The edition printed here is an enhanced version of the one by Nicholson, with Nicholson's introductory essays and notes translated into Persian. 4 vols; volume 2.
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Ākhirīn taṣḥīḥ-i Raynūld A. Nīkulsūn va muqābalah-ʼi mujaddad bā nuskhah-i Qūnīyah. :
1 online resource. :
9789004406322
9786002030801
Asnād-i pādiriyān-i Karmilī : Bāz mānda az ʿaṣr-i Shāh ʿAbbās-i Ṣafawī /
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During the reign of the Safavid Shāh ʿAbbās I (reg. 996-1038/1588-1629), Isfahan was the center of power, diplomacy and trade of Iran. Every year scores of diplomatic envoys and traders would make their way to the capital in pursuit of some political or commercial gain. The present collection of Persian letters and documents, whose originals are kept in the Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele III in Naples, gives a fine view of the major issues in international relations that ʿAbbās I had to deal with during most of his reign. The collection consists for the greater part of translations of documents from various European courts and religious bodies and authorities, prepared by the interpreters of the Carmelite mission in Isfahan. Among the subjects: the silk trade, Anglo-Spanish relations, the threat of the Ottomans, the importance of Russia in an alternative trade route to Europe, foreign access to Persia's ports, and the interests of the Catholic church.
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1 online resource. :
9789004404120
9789646781955
Rāshīkāt al-Hind : Tanāsub nazd-i Hindiyān /
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Abū Rayḥān al-Bīrūnī (d. after 442/1050) is one of the greatest scholars in the history of Islam. A native of Kāth, capital of Khwārazm, he wrote on subjects ranging from mathematics, geography, astronomy and natural science to history, linguistics and ethnography. He was a student of, among others, the astronomer-mathematicians Kushyār b. Labbān (fl. 390/1000) and Abū Maḥmūd al-Khujandī (d. 390/1000). He also met and corresponded with Avicenna (d. 428/1037). As was common for a scholar of his rank in those days, he spent his life in the entourage of powerful rulers, in Khwārazm, Khurāsān, and Sidjistān. It was at the court of Maḥmūd b. Sebüktigin (d. 421/1030) and his sucessors in Ghazna that he accompanied Maḥmūd on his campaigns to north-west India. It is there that he got acquainted with Indian methods in the arithmetic of proportions and ratios, the subject of this book. Arabic text with a Persian translation by the editor.
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1 online resource. :
9789004405615
9789648700954
Sharḥ al-Taʿarruf li-madhhab al-taṣawwuf /
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The Kitāb al-taʿarruf li-madhhab al-taṣawwuf by Abū Bakr b. Isḥāq al-Kalābādhī (d. 380-85/990-995) is one of the most famous early manuals on Sufism. Written in Bukhara under the strongly orthodox Samanids, it consists of four parts: an explanation of the term ṣūfī and a listing of famous Sufis with a typology of their writings, an exposition of the Sufī creed and its conformity with orthodox Islam, an explanation of the spiritual path of the Sufi with accompanying terminology, and a description of Sufi conduct and of their special relation with God. The work saw four commentaries, the present one by Ismāʿīl Mustamlī Būkhārī (d. 434/1043) being one of them. Starting each time with a brief quotation from the original Arabic, the commentary in Persian. This is a facsimile edition of a manuscript from the Bhīravī collection in the National Archives of Pakistan, dated 473/1081. The manuscript is incomplete, with about half of the commentary missing.
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"Nuskhah bargardān bih qaṭʻ-i aṣl-i nuskhah-i khaṭṭī bih shumārah-i 207.1959. M. N. Mūzih-i Millī-i Pākistān (Karāchī), kitābat-i 473 H." :
1 online resource. :
9789004406216
9786002030634
Seh risāla az Thābit b. Qurra : Sāʿathā-yi āftābī, Ḥarakat-i khurshīd u māh, Chahārdah wajhī muḥāṭ dar kurah /
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Thābit b. Qurra (d. 288/901) was a gifted mathematician, scientist and translator of many Greek scientific works, who knew Greek, Syriac and Arabic. He might have spent his entire life in his native Ḥarrān as a money-changer were it not for his chance encounter with Muḥammad b. Mūsā (259/873) of the famous Banū Mūsā brothers, specialists in mathematics and astronomy and among the most important intellectuals of Baghdad at the time. Appreciating his intelligence and his mastery of languages, Muḥammad took Thābit back with him to Baghdad, where he was trained in philosophy, astronomy and mathematics. Thābit then set out on a brilliant career as a translator and author in his own right, writing on all the applied sciences of his time. This facsimile edition of three texts on sundials, solar and lunar motions, and a fourteen-sided solid inside a sphere reproduces the well-known MS Istanbul, Köprülü 948, dated 370/981, copied by Thābit's grandson Ibrāhīm.
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"Nuskhah bargardān bih qaṭʻ-i aṣl-i nuskhah-i khaṭṭī bih shumārah-i 948 Kitābkhānah-i Kūprūlū (Istānbūl) kitābat 370 hijrī".
"A facsimile edition of the manuscript (MS 948, Koprulu Library, Istanbul, Turkey) copied in 370 A.H (981 A.D)"--Added title page. :
1 online resource. :
9789004406360
9786002030511