TARIKH-E ELM
Year:2011 | Volume:- | Issue:9|Papers Count:8

Abu Hatam Muzaffar Asfizari (5th and 6th centuries A.H.), the great Iranian mathematician, astronomers and scholors, was a contemporary of Khayyam. We don’t know much about his life excert what has been mentioned in some historians’ and scholars’, works. Amony his most remarkable scientific achievements, we can mention his role in vernal equinox in order to modify and improve chronology and Jalali Calender. Although, unfortumately, some of his works have still not been discovered or have been lost, he has some works in different fields such as Mathematics, mechanics, weight measurement, cosmology and botany.In this article, two separate theses are presented, which were amony Asfizari, s lost works. The first thesis is an Arabic mathematical one called “Borhan ala Jam a-i al-Morabb aat-i al- Motivaliah” focusing on geometrical proving of the total squares numbers. The second thesis is a Persian one called “Risalat-i al- Shabakah” in botany, focusing on analysis of a plant parts and surveying vessel network system in plant and the way leaves and fruit are fed through these vessles. This significant thesis show how Islamic scholors, despite having no accurate instruments, had looked profoundly and scientifically in natural issues.

Abu Sahl Wijan (Bizhan) ibn Rustam al-Kuhi the 10th century mathematician and astronomer was from Tabaristn (present Mazandarn) province of Iran. Apart from his rich legacy kept in several manuscripts and studied, edited and translated widely, we know that some of his works have been lost. In this article, Kuhi’s lost mathematical works are traced through references and quotations in the works of other scholars, especially his contemporary al-Sijz, and Kuhi himself.

In India, there are extant two nineteenth century specimens of an otherwise unknown astronomical instrument called Shabnuma-wa-Ruznuma with which observations can be done both in the day and at night. While the Ruznuma is nothing but a sine/horary quadrant, the Shabnuma appears to be inspired by the Sanskrit instrument Dhruvabhrama-yantra which was invented by Padmanabha in the first quarter of the fifteenth century in Central India. After a brief description of the Dhruvabhrama-yantra, the two specimens of the Shabnuma-wa-Ruznuma are described in detail.

Cinnamon plant, especially its peel, is one of the considerable spices for its using as drug, spice and freshener from ancient times. Distribution of different kinds of cinnamon is in some regions of eastern and southern Asia and it has been traded to other countries. But because of the importance and high price of this spice, its history has been mixed with tales and superstitions. This article attempt is made to identify the true origin, history and trade routes of this important spice, and also its main merchants by using documentary study and analysis of information in historical references and modern botany books. For this purpose, probable, but bordering on certainty, trade routes of cinnamon have been studied. Also, the different origins been noticed in historic books, have been divided in four groups: China, Ceylon, India, and Arabia peninsula and Ethiopia. Then the correct origin of cinnamon will be determined.

From bygone to now, Colors are aspects of nature that have been regarded scientists. In ancient Greece, essence of color and its relationship with light and vision in Natural Philosophy and especially Optics has been studied. Results of Greek thinkers in the field Chromatics, from Pythagoras to Aristotle through of translating scientific and philosophical texts, received to Muslim scholars and have been improved. Among Muslim scholars until the end of the sixth century AH, theories of intellectuals like Al-Kindi, Ayub Surrey, Ikhwan al-Safa, Ibn Hytham, Avicenna, Suhrawardi and Neyshbori are considerable. Review theories of these scientists show that Chromatics in the Muslim world strongly influenced by the Greeks knowledge and especially Aristotle. These theories have been discussed relationship of light and colors, essence of colors, color mixing and identify the main colors.

The extant work of the mathematician and philosopher Hisam al-Din Ali ibn Fadl-Allah al-Salar is limited to some small mathematical treatises and a book named Jami Qawanin Ilm al-Haya (Compendium of the Laws of the Science of Astronomy). The latter has been used by Nasir al-Din al-Tusi in writing his Kashf al-Qina an Asrar al-Shakl al-Qatta (Removing the Veils of the Secrets of Sector Figure). Nevertheless, he is rarely mentioned in ancient sources and what we find about him in modern scholarship is largely false and contradictory. Some place him at the beginning of the sixth century AH, others at the middle of the seventh century AH. Still others, while accepting that the Compendium of the Laws of the Science of Astronomy has been written about the middle of the sixth century AH, believe that it belongs to another author, because they consider Hisam al-Din as an author of the seventh century AH. In this article, we show that the Compendium of the Laws of the Science of Astronomy has been written about the middle of the fifth century AH, its author is no one but Hisam al-Din al-Salar and all that has been written to the contrary is due to the confusion between Hisam al-Din al-Salar and two other persons named Hisam al-Din Munajjim and Hisam al-Din Shami. We will also introduce another work by Hisam al-Din al-Salar and discuss his place in the history of trigonometry.

The problem of the finitude of dimensions has been discussed by Islamic philosophers in “Physics”. However, since the finitude and infinitude are among the essential occurrings of magnitude, which itself is the subject matter of geometry, it seems that the problem should be classified among the geometrical problems instead of physical ones. In their works Islamic philosophers have discussed this problem as the problem of the “finitude of bodies”, and if we recall that “body” has two meanings in Islamic philosophy, the natural or physical body and the mathematical one, we can dissolve this problem by stating that what has been discussed in physics is the finitude or infinitude of the body in the first meaning and what has been discussed in geometry is the finitude or infinitude of body in the second meaning. In other words, the finitude of dimensions has been discussed in geometry in an absolute way, while physics has discussed the finitude of the dimensions as far as they relate to matter, and then the proofs of the finitude of dimensions in the general science of geometry have been transferred to the special science of physics.