Islamicate Influence on Knowledge-Making

• Islam significantly influenced knowledge-making in the Mediterranean and western Asia.
• Islamicate scholars contributed terms like "algebra," "azimuth," "algorithm," "alcohol," "alkali," and "alembic."

Islamicate Power Expansion

• Islamicate power rapidly expanded after Prophet Muhammad’s death in 632 CE.
• The Arab-governed state fractured into a western sphere in southern Spain (Córdoba) and an eastern sphere including northern Africa, Arabia, and Mesopotamia.
• The Abbasid Caliphate (750–1517) in the east served as a crossroads for Persian, Indian, and Byzantine cultures and various religions.
• High literacy rates, due to Islam's focus on the Qur’an, enabled many noble men to study natural philosophical texts.
• Islam promoted treating others as equals, fostering a more egalitarian knowledge production.
• Ongoing support from pious philanthropists, including heads of state, helped Islamicate polymaths study natural phenomena systematically.

Baghdad and the House of Wisdom

• Baghdad, founded in 754 by Caliph al-Mansur, became the largest urban area by 930, with a population of one million.
• Baghdad housed the Bayt al-Ḥikmah or House of Wisdom, which grew from al-Mansur’s private collection.
• Caliph al-Rashid supported the Translation Movement.
• In 799, Charlemagne sent a mission to al-Rashid’s court with gifts; in 802, al-Rashid sent Charlemagne an embassy including an elephant named Abul-Abbas and a water clock.
• Caliph al-Maʾmūn refounded the House of Wisdom in 832 as an international center for translation and research.
• By 850, the House of Wisdom became the largest library in the world.
• Al-Maʾmūn sponsored families of scholar–translators to bring texts into Arabic from Greek, Chinese, Sanskrit, Persian, and Syriac.

Translation Movement (750–950)

• The Translation Movement began with Persian texts concerning astrology and astronomy.
• Al-Maʾmūn sent emissaries to collect Greek scientific manuscripts and demanded them as loot in war.
• By 950, virtually every Greek scholarly text had been translated multiple times.
• Ibn Rushd, a great Islamicate philosopher, is known as “The Commentator” for his affinity for Aristotle.
• More classical Greek commentaries on Aristotle may be available in Arabic than English.

Reasons for Supporting Translation

• Scientific translation was seen as a sign of civic status.
• Astronomy improvements led to more accurate timekeeping for mosques.
• Improved geographical knowledge helped align prayers to Mecca.
• The Translation Movement fostered an appreciation for reasoned thought giving rise to the school of mu‘tazilism.
• Mu‘tazila, like al-Maʾmūn, believed rationalism could be used to understand the physical world and God.

Centers of Learning

• Places of learning included observatories, hospitals, public libraries, mosques, and madrasas (Islamic colleges).
• Madrasas were critical centers of knowledge transmission, with thirty in Baghdad in the 1200s and one hundred and fifty in Damascus by 1500.
• Each madrasa had its own library full of paper books.
• Madrasas taught law and Greek natural philosophy, including logic, arithmetic, astronomy, and astrology.

Advancements and Innovations

• Abbasid scholars wrote commentaries on translated texts, comparing, summarizing, and analyzing them.
• Observatories arose throughout the Islamicate world, and al-Maʾmūn built two.
• By the late ninth century, Islamicate polymaths proposed heliocentric models of the solar system.
• In geography, Islamicate scholars extended Ptolemy’s system.
• Al-Maʾmūn commissioned a measurement of Earth’s circumference, resulting in a measurement of 24,480 miles (less than 2% off from the modern measurement of 24,901 miles).
• Islamicate astronomers improved astrolabes by adding the azimuth.

Mathematics

• Medieval Islamicate scholars focused on arithmetic and algebra.
• They adopted the number zero and “Arabic” decimal-style numerals from India.
• They also developed trigonometry.
• Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi wrote Kitab al-Jabr (820), setting out the general rules for solving equations, introducing a theory that treated all numbers as similar objects.
• This opened exploration into algorithms, quadratic equations, and polynomial equations.

Other Fields

• Thinkers such as Mohammad Mūsā worked on the basic laws of physics.
• Others focused on optics, performing many experiments.
• Doctors and philosophers trained and traded works.

Engineering

• The Abbasid state privileged public service, focusing on improving useful arts such as hydraulic engineering and agricultural science.
• The Abbasids used the arch rather than the Greek post and lintel system.
• They constructed large dams, waterwheels, and qanats.
• In 850, the Banū Mūsā brothers wrote The Book of Ingenious Devices, including the earliest programmable machine.
• In 1206, al-Jazarī wrote The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices, covering one hundred machines.
• Al-Jazarī invented the camshaft, an early version of the crankshaft, and the segmental gear.
• Al-Jazarī constructed a four-piece robot band that floated on a lake, entertaining party guests.

Islamicate scholars significantly influenced knowledge-making in the Mediterranean and western Asia, contributing terms like 'algebra' and 'algorithm.' The expansion of Islamicate power facilitated cultural exchange and high literacy rates, fostering egalitarian knowledge production. Support from philanthropists enabled systematic study of natural phenomena.