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A Brief History of Science

Lecture 5 – Islam and the
Middle Age
THOMAS OSIPOWICZ|GEH1018
Islam and the Middle Ages
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 We consider the social and historical context of the time period (600 – 1300
AD), the triumph of Islam, and the Dark & Middle Ages in the West.
 Discuss Islamic scholars and their contributions and projects: Geber, Al-
Khwarizimi, and Al-Hazen and their significance for later scientific inquiry.
 Understand the historical context of the first Universities and the European
Sciences, and their development from prior influences and contributions.
 Appreciate the contributions and projects of Grosseteste, Bacon and their
significance (beneficial & detrimental) in later scientific inquiry.
 We will see how Thomas Aquinas, combining Christian ideas and Aristotelian
ideas, got into trouble with the Church.
North Africa & The Rise of Islam (600 to 1300 AD)
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 North Africa and the Levant had been part of the
Roman Empire and so contained much Greek learning
and culture.
 In particular, the city of Alexandria in Egypt had been
the centre of Greek science and mathematics, heavily
influenced by the work of Aristotle.
 This knowledge remained largely intact, even after the
fall of the western Roman Empire.
 From 600 AD onwards the Islamic Civilizations
conquered and dominated the Arabian peninsula,
Persia, North Africa and most of Spain.
 Throughout the Dark and Middle Ages in Europe,
Arabic civilizations were much more learned in
sciences, mathematics, astronomy and medicine than
anything found in Europe.
The timeline shows that Arab names dominate for centuries
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Fall of Constantinople
1453
North Africa and The Spread of Islam - Map

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 622 AD : Hijra - migration to
Medina (first year of Islamic
calendar)
 632 AD: Death of
Muhammad
 635 AD: Damascus annexed
 637 AD : Conquest of
Jerusalem
 648 - 718 AD: Unsuccessful
sieges of Constantinople
 641- AD: Conquest of
Alexandria
 711 AD : Conquest of Toledo
 732 AD: The battle of Tours
 750 – Abbasid dynasty, 762:
capital moved to Baghdad,
 In Tours, now France, Frankish leader Karl Martel beats the large Umayyad line continues in
invading Islamic army led by Emir Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi. Spain).

 This was the basis of the Carolingian Empire and the Frankish
domination of Europe for the next century, see p 17.
Islamic contributions to Medieval Europe
 Many Islamic contributions to Medieval Europe: 6
 Art, architecture medicine, agriculture, music, language, education, law, and technology.
 From the 10th to the 13th century, Europe absorbed much of that knowledge. This was one
of the most important causes/reasons of the Renaissance.
 In the Middle East, many of Greek texts lost in the west (Aristotle), were translated from
Greek into Syriac and Arabic during the 6th and the 7th century by monks living in
Palestine, and by Greek exiles from Athens who visited Islamic Universities.
 Many of these texts were kept, translated, and developed further by the Islamic world,
especially in centres of learning such as Baghdad, where the Bayt al-Hikmah (House of
Wisdom), had thousands of manuscripts as early as 832 AD.
 These texts were translated again into European languages during the Middle Ages.
Eastern Christians played an important role in exploiting this knowledge, especially through
the Christian Aristotelian School of Baghdad in the 11th and 12th centuries.
 Texts were translated into Latin in multiple ways. The main points of transmission of Islamic
knowledge to Europe were in Sicily, and Spain.
 The translation movement was assisted by a very important technological advance — the
production of paper, which the Muslims learned from Chinese prisoners in 751.
Islamic natural philosophy
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 Scholars in the Islamic world built extensively on the scientific foundations adopted
from the Greeks.
 Not just a conservation of knowledge from antiquity (which was, until recently, the
standard European view).
 Progress was made in many fields, such as algebra, chemistry, geology, spherical
trigonometry, astronomy, mathematics and medicine, later to be transferred to
Europe.
 Geber (721 - 815 AD)
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 Geber is the Latin name of Abu Musa Jabir ibn Hayyan, who was
Persian.
 He was a chemist and alchemist, astronomer, astrologer, engineer,
geologist, philosopher, physicist, and pharmacist and physician.
 He is considered by many to be the father of chemistry and the first
practical alchemist.
 He emphasised systematic experimentation, attempting to free
alchemy from superstition and turned it into a science.
 He invented over twenty types of chemical laboratory equipment
and discovered/described many chemical substances and
processes, such as the hydrochloric and nitric acids, distillation,
crystallisation, at the foundation of modern chemistry and chemical
engineering.
Jabir ibn Hayyan – Codici
The first essential in chemistry is that you should perform practical work Ashburnhamiani, 1166, Biblioteca
and conduct experiments, for he who performs not practical work nor Medicea Laurenziana, Florence
makes experiments will never attain the least degree of mastery.
 Al-Khwarizmi and Arabic mathematics (800 - 850 AD)

 Baghdad was the centre of the Islamic Empire which stretched from India to
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the Mediterranean. Arts and sciences were well-advanced in this period,
certainly compared with Europe.
 In 820 AD the caliph founded the House of Wisdom in Baghdad, which
included a library containing translations of many Greek texts and
astronomical observations.
 Along with all other libraries in Baghdad, the House of Wisdom was destroyed
during the Mongol invasion in 1258. It was said that the waters of the Tigris ran
black for six months with ink from the enormous quantities of books flung into
the river.
A stamp issued in the
 Al-Khwarizmi was a mathematician, geographer and astronomer. He is Soviet Union,
credited with inventing Arabic numerals 0 - 9, though they were actually commemorating
developed in India about 500 AD. He certainly introduced them into Europe. al-Khwarizmi's
 Consider just how great an advance this was, compared with Roman (approximate) 1200th
numerals, where 1999 is represented as MCMXCVIIII (!). Imagine trying to birthday, 1983
perform complex calculations in this system.
 Numbers, Etymologies of algorithm and algebra
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 The name “Al-Khwarizmi” became “algorismi”
became “algorithm”, sets of rules for calculation.
 Al-Khwarizmi wrote the first book on algebra we know,
called Calculating by Completion and Balancing
 The Arab title was “Hisab al-jabr w'almuqabala”,
which became the source for our “algebra”.
 A Latin translation of his book was available in Europe
from 1145.
 He also introduced quadratic equations (describing
them in words, not with the symbolic algebra of
today).

The concept of algorithm would become a very

important concept in logic, mathematics, all of Al-Khwarizmi invented the way we write
science – and now in social contexts: Some of your numerals. The system is based upon how
twitter/facebook/insta feed is created algorithmically, many angles are in the number.
with consequences many find frightening.
 Al-Hazen (965 - 1039 AD) More at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7810846.stm
 Alhazen (Latin name of the Persian Ibn al-Haytham, who lived in Cairo. 11
 He avanced optics, anatomy, astronomy, engineering, mathematics, medicine,
ophthalmology, philosophy, physics, psychology, visual perception. Introduced a form
of the scientific method.
 He is called the father of modern optics for his influential Book of Optics, experimented
with lenses & mirrors, refraction, reflection, and the dispersion of light into its constituent
colours.
 Two major theories on vision prevailed in classical antiquity:
 Extromissive, assumes that the eye emits rays of light, works as a “foundation” of
geometry (Euclid, Ptolemy and others).
 Intromissive: Epicur, (sometimes) Aristotle and others: entities entering the eye from an
object. (e.g.: If all there is are atoms and the void, then maybe some atoms are always Alhazen on Iraqi 10
“peeling off” and may hit the eye). Dinar.
 Alhazen combined parts of the mathematical ray arguments of Euclid and the
intromission theories of Aristotle: "from each point of every colored body, illuminated by
any light, issue light and color along every straight line that can be drawn from that
point". This led him to assume a finite speed of light.

The duty of the man who investigates the writings of scientists, if learning the truth is his goal, is to make himself
an enemy of all that he reads, and ... attack it from every side. He should also suspect himself as he performs
his critical examination of it, so that he may avoid falling into either prejudice or leniency.
The decline in Islamic civilization (13th century) 12
 By the 13th century, a relative decline in Islamic civilization was evident.
 Around 1500, Islamic scientific culture was trailing that of the Latin West – which saw
dramatic progress, as we will see soon.
 The reasons for this are still under debate, among them:
 There was widespread destabilization of the Islamic Empire, because of internal
fractionalization,
 The improving situation in the Latin West brought armies against Islamic lands: In the
11th century, Muslims lost much of Spain and all of Sicily, and the First Crusade
conquered the Levant.
 In the east, Mongol hordes were on the move against Islam, ending with the tragic
destruction of Baghdad in 1258, an astounding loss to Western civilization.
 One internal problem may have been the rise of occasionalist philosophies, in
which every action is a direct effect of God’s will, thus eliminating the idea of
regular natural laws, which are crucial to support rational inquiry into the natural
world.
 The Dark Ages in Europe
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 529 AD may be considered as the start of the Dark Ages in
Europe. There was no Roman (or Holy Roman) emperor in the
West, Plato's Academy, was closed by Justinian and the first
monasteries were founded, acting as the dominant storehouses
of knowledge and scholasticism.
 The church was the only functioning organization which
operated over large areas. Monasteries kept and controlled
information. But, at least, it was kept …
 The system of roads was not maintained, travel became much
more difficult.
 Itinerant Kingship was the rule in many countries: The king and his
court travel constantly from one residence to the next, because
not enough food can be produced locally.
 Europe suffered many wars and invasions, and in general Triumph of Christianity
Tommaso Laureti (1530–1602), Vatican
people had other things to consider than natural philosophy. Palace, celebrating the triumph of
Christianity over the paganism of
Antiquity.
The Carolingian Renaissance (late 8th to 9th century)
 There were several attempts to recover Latin culture
in Europe after the collapse, one by Charlemagne.
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 Charlemagne was crowned, first as King of the
Franks, then, in 800, as Holy Roman Emperor.
 He decreed that cathedrals and monasteries were
required to maintain schools, initially to train the
clergy.
 The attempt to recreate the Roman Empire failed,
and within a couple of generations most gains made
dissipated. The schools survived, though.

Alcuin of York, in Aachen, developed Carolingian

script, intended to be easy to read.
 15
The term “Dark Ages” was initially
coined by the Italian scholar
Petrarch in 1330.

It is now considered judgemental by

many, and the terms such as ‘late
antiquity’ are used.

Charting the "Rise of the West“, The Journal of

Economic History, Vol. 69, No. 2 (2009),
 The Middle Ages (900-1450 AD)
 Rediscovery of enormous amounts of lost knowledge of the ancient Greeks 16
and new knowledge from the Islamic world.
 Europe was dominated by the church, with a rigid, conservative hierarchy.
Change and questioning of existing ideas was not generally welcomed.
 It was during this time that the first universities were founded in Europe, toward
the end of the 12th century.
 Improved mechanical & metal working skills were acquired in the Middle
Ages. This eventually led to the development of the printing press, the
compass and gunpowder (all three were known in China much earlier).
 Crop rotation was introduced/improved, leading to better food supply: If
slowly, conditions improved.
 One important thing that did not happen in the Middle Ages was the utter
devastation caused by Mongol invasions in China, India and the Islamic
World.
A history of medieval Europe,
 Tamerlane advanced as far as Turkey in 1400 AD then turned back to invade from the bubonic plague and
China (most likely because Europe was not worth bothering with). the Papal Schism to the Hundred
Years' War
– highly recommended
 It was a time of slow growth and slow acquisition of knowledge and
technology - but without it the Renaissance would not have been possible.
 The Crusades (1095-1298)
 In 1096, Pope Urban II called for “holy war” to “recapture” control of Jerusalem from the 17
Muslim Arabs and Seljuk Turks. Many theories to explain why he did this were put forward
(Unify Christendom? Too many second sons? ...)
 Eight crusades were carried out. A Latin kingdom was established at Jerusalem in 1099,
but after 200 years the crusades ended in inglorious failure.
 Constantinople was sacked during the
Fourth Crusade, making the re-
unification of Christendom impossible.
 Lasting Effects:
 Opening of the Mediterranean to
commerce and travel (enabling
Genoa and Venice to flourish).
 Strengthened the collective identity of
the Latin Church under the pope.
 The crusades also reinforced the
connection between Western
Christendom, feudalism, and militarism.
First Universities (not only in Europe)

 18 of
“University”, from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, roughly meaning "community
teachers and scholars".
 In India, Nalanda University had been founded in Bihar in the 5th century BC. Another Indian
university whose ruins were only recently excavated was Ratnagiri University in Orissa.
 Nanjing University in China was established in 258 AD.
 The University of Constantinople (849 AD): first institution of higher learning with “modern” features
(research and teaching, academic independence, etc).
 The University of Al Karaouine in Fez (859AD), Morocco: oldest still (continually) operating and the first
degree awarding institution in the world.
 Al-Azhar University, Cairo, Egypt, 10th century, often regarded as the first full-fledged university.
 Many of the medieval universities in Europe were founded by the Church, usually as cathedral
schools.
 A continuation of the interest in learning promoted by monasteries and their primary role was to
prepare clergymen for a religious career, rather than teaching and research as we know it today.
 University of Salerno (Medical school in the 9th century) and Bologna (1088), in Italy.
 University of Paris ( about 1100) in France.
 University of Oxford (11th century) in England.
 European Science in the Middle Ages I
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 Philosophical and scientific teaching of the Early Middle Ages was largely based upon
few copies and commentaries of ancient Greek texts that remained in Western Europe
after the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.
 This changed greatly during the 12th century.
 Increased contact with the Islamic world in Spain and Sicily, the Crusades, the
Reconquista in Spain, as well as increased contact with Constantinople, allowed
Europeans to seek and translate the works of Hellenic and Islamic philosophers and
scientists, especially the works of Aristotle, Euclid, Ptolemy, Plotinus, Geber, Al-
Khwarizmi, Alhazen, and Averroes.
 The development of medieval universities allowed them to aid materially in the
translation and propagation of these texts and started a new infrastructure which was
needed for scientific communities.
European Science in the Middle Ages II
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 By the beginning of the 13th century there were reasonably accurate Latin
translations of the main works of almost all the ancient authors, allowing a
sound transfer of scientific ideas via both the universities and the monasteries.
 The natural science contained in these texts began to be extended by many,
among them Robert Grosseteste and Roger Bacon.
 Precursors of the modern scientific method can be seen already in
Grosseteste's emphasis on mathematics as a way to understand nature, and
in the empirical approach admired by Bacon, in his Opus Majus.
 By the first half of the 14th century much important scientific work is being
done, largely within the framework of scholastic commentaries on Aristotle's
scientific writings.
Latin translations of the 12th century
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 The 12th century saw a major search by European scholars for new learning,
which led them to the Arabic fringes of Europe, especially to Islamic Spain and
Sicily.
 One example is Gerard of Cremona, Italy (1114 - 1187), who:
 … because of his love for the Almagest, which he did not find amongst the
Latins, made his way to Toledo, where seeing an abundance of books in Arabic
on every subject, and pitying the poverty he experienced among the Latins
concerning these subjects, out of his desire to translate he thoroughly learnt the
Arabic language.
(Toledo had been taken by Christians in 1085 already. The above quote is from
his students.)
 Unlike the later interest in the literature of classical antiquity in the Renaissance,
12th century translators sought new scientific, philosophical and religious texts.
 Interest in religious texts was reflected in a renewed interest in translations of the
Greek Church Fathers into Latin, a concern with translating Jewish teachings
from Hebrew, and most significantly, an interest in the Koran and other Islamic
religious texts. Arabic literature was also translated into Latin.
 Robert Grosseteste (1175 – 1253)
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 An an English statesman, scholastic philosopher and Bishop,
sometimes called the real founder of the tradition of scientific
thought in Oxford during the middle ages, and in some ways, of
modern English intellectual tradition.
 From 1220 to 1235 he wrote many scientific works on topics
including astronomy, light, the tides, rainbows and mathematical
reasoning.
 He wrote a number of commentaries on Aristotle, and was the first
of the Scholastics to fully understand Aristotle's dual path of scientific
reasoning: generalizing from particular observations into a universal
law, and then back from universal laws to prediction of particulars,
which he called resolution and composition.
 That is, one may formulate universal laws about nature, from which it
is possible to make further predictions and observations.
 These ideas (with other, non-Aristotelian ideas), established a Bishop Robert Grosseteste,
tradition that carried forward to Padua and Galileo in the 17th St Paul's Parish Church,
century. Morton near Gainsborough
 Roger Bacon 1214 – 1294 I

 Known as Doctor Mirabilis (Latin for wonderful teacher ), he was an English 23

philosopher and Franciscan friar.
 He placed considerable emphasis on empiricism during a time when
natural philosophy and intellectual rigour were almost forgotten.
 He became a Master at Oxford, lecturing on Aristotle. Between 1237 and
1245, he began to lecture at the university of Paris, then the centre of
intellectual life in Europe.
 He was inspired by the works of Plato via earlier Islamic scholars. He
changed (in mid-life) from a predominantly Aristotelian to a Statue of Roger Bacon
predominantly Neoplatonic thinking, thereby considering mathematics as in the Oxford University
primary, not logic (in the limited way Aristotelian syllogisms allow proofs). Museum
 In 1256 he became a Friar in the Franciscan Order, so could not hold a
teaching post, and after 1260, his activities were further restricted by a
Franciscan statute forbidding Friars from publishing books or pamphlets
without specific approval.
 He got round this by his acquaintance with Pope Clement IV in 1265, who
issued a mandate ordering Bacon to write to him concerning the place of
philosophy within theology.
 Roger Bacon 1214 - 1294 II
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 As a result Bacon sent the Pope his Opus Majus, which
presented his views on how the philosophy of Aristotle
and the new science could be incorporated into a new
theology.
 Bacon possessed one of the best minds of his age, and
made many discoveries. His book Opus Majus contains
treatments of mathematics, optics, alchemy,
manufacture of gunpowder, astronomy and anticipates
the invention of microscopes, telescopes, spectacles,
flying machines, hydraulics and steam ships.
 His study of optics draws on the work of Alhazen.
including a discussion of the physiology of eyesight,
anatomy of the eye and brain and considers direct
vision, reflected vision, and refraction, mirrors and lenses.
 Thomas Aquinas 1225 - 1274
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 He was a very influential Italian Dominican monk, both a theologian and a
philosopher (there was not much difference between them during this time).
 He was responsible for many ancient Greek texts obtained from Arabs in
Spain and Sicily being translated into Latin, so they could be read in Europe.
This meant that many more of the teachings of Aristotle were now available.
 The church was initially enthusiastic about this, since many of Aristotle’s views
agreed with their own, such as his views on women, the perfections of the
heavens, and geocentrism.
 Aristotle was effectively ‘adopted’ by the catholic church. Anyone who
disagreed with any of his finding was viewed as disagreeing with the church,
so there was trouble looming …
An altarpiece in Ascoli
 Thomas Aquinas was responsible for the ‘Christianizing’ of Aristotle, trying to Piceno, Italy, by Carlo
synthesize his scientific wisdom in logic and natural philosophy with Christian Crivelli
theology. His approach was that Aristotle’s wisdom was incomplete, since he (15th century)

lived and died before Jesus, so Christianity completed his work.

University of Paris - Aristotle
 After the works of Aristotle were available in the late 13th century, scholasticism was
developed, a systematic method to study anything, using Aristotle's tools: logic and the
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‘four causes’. The basic structure were lectures and disputations:
A yes/no question is given by the teacher, a student answers, and another student
criticises this answer. Finally, the teacher resolves the question.
 Questions concerned were interpretations of the Bible, Aristotle, Augustine etc.
 But: Aristotle was a pagan, some of his views were clearly not in line with Christian
doctrine: For example, he thought the world was eternal, not created.
 In 1277, an official condemnation was issued: 219 Aristotelian propositions, which were
seen to limit the powers of God in some way, many dealing directly with scientific issues,
were banned. This may have been helpful, in opening up new thinking:
 Example: the condemnation rejected the proposition that God could not create more
than one world. So then, some medievals began to think about the possibility of other
worlds, outside the sphere of the fixed stars, possibly with “extraterrestrial” life, maybe
intelligent (and perhaps in need of a Redeemer)
 However gradually, the church lost its authority over the universities.
 The end of the middle ages marked the beginning of the change of universities which
would eventually result in what we know today.