Islamic world contributions to Medieval Europe

Christian and Muslim playing chess in the Levant. The game of chess originated in India, but was transmitted to Europe by the Islamic world.

The Islamic contributions to Medieval Europe were important and numerous. These contributions affected such varied areas as sciences, techniques, medicine, food, music, vocabulary, education, literature, law, philosophy and technology. From the 10th to the 13th century, Europe literally absorbed vast quantities of knowledge from the Islamic civilization. This had considerable effects on the development of the West, leading in many ways to the achievement of the Renaissance.

Transmission routes

Further information: Latin translations of the 12th century

The Tabula Rogeriana, drawn by Al-Idrisi for Roger II of Sicily in 1154, one of the most advanced ancient world maps.

The points of contact between Europe and Islamic lands were multiple during the Middle Ages. The main points of transmission of Islamic knowledge to Europe were in Sicilia, and in Toledo, Spain (with Gerard of Cremone, 1114-1187, following the conquest of the city by the Spanish Christians in 1085). In Sicilia, following the Islamic conquest of the island in 965 and its reconquest by the Normans in 1091, an intense Arabo-Normand culture developed, examplified by rulers such as Roger II, who had Islamic soldiers, poets and scientists at his court. One of the greatest geographical treatises of the Middle Ages was written by the Maroccan Idrisi for Roger, and entitled Kitab Rudjdjar ("The book of Roger").

The Crusades also intensified exchanges between Europe and the Levant, with Italian City Republics taking a great role in these exchanges. In the Levant, such cities as Antioch, Arab and Latin cultures intermixed intensively.

Classical knowledge

Following the fall of the Roman Empire and the dawn of the Middle Ages, many texts from Classical Antiquity had been lost to the Europeans. In the Middle East however, many of these Greek texts (such as Aristotle) were translated from Greek into Syriac during the 6th and the 7th century by Nestorian, Melkites or Jacobite monks living in Palestine, or by Greeks exiles from Athens or Edessa who visited Islamic Universities. Many of these texts however were then kept, translated, and developed upon by the Islamic world, especially in centers of learning such as Baghdad, where a “House of Wisdom”, with thousands of manuscripts existed as soon as 832. These texts were translated again into European languages during the Middle Ages. Eastearn Christians played an important role in exploiting this knowledge, especially through the Christian Aristotelician School of Baghdad in the 11th and 12th centuries.

These texts were translated back into Latin in multiple ways. The main points of transmission of Islamic knowledge to Europe were in Sicilia, and in Toledo, Spain (with Gerard of Cremone, 1114-1187). The Crusades also intensified exchanges between Europe and the Levant. Burgondio of Pise (died in 1193) who discovered in Antioch lost texts of Aristotle and translated them in Latin.

Islamic sciences

Further information: Latin translations of the 12th century

See also: Islamic science

Chirurgical operation, 15th century Turkish manuscript.

Islam was not however a simple retransmitter of knowledge from antiquity. It also developed it own sciences, such as algebra, arithmetics, trigonometry, geology, which were later transmitted to the West. Stefan of Pise translated into Latin around 1127 an Arab manual of medical theory. Modern Arabian numbers were developed by al-Khwarizmi (hence the word “Algorithm”) in the 9th century, and introduced in Europe by Leonardo Fibonacci (1170-1250). A translation of the algebra of al-Kharizmi if known as early as 1145, by a certain Robert of Chester. Alhazen (Ibn al-Haytham 980-1037) compiled treaties on optical sciences, which were used as references by Newton and Descartes. Medical sciences were also highly developed in Islam as testified by the Crusaders, who relied on Arab doctors on numerous occasions. Joinville reports he was saved in 1250 by a “Saracen” doctor.

Contributing to the growth of European science was the major search by European scholars for new learning which they could only find among Muslims, especially in Islamic Spain and Sicily. These scholars translated new scientific and philosophical texts from Arabic into Latin.

One of the most productive translators in Spain was Gerard of Cremona, who translated 87 books from Arabic to Latin, including Muhammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī's On Algebra and Almucabala, Jabir ibn Aflah's Elementa astronomica, al-Kindi's On Optics, Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Kathīr al-Farghānī's On Elements of Astronomy on the Celestial Motions, al-Farabi's On the Classification of the Sciences, the chemical and medical works of Razi, the works of Thabit ibn Qurra and Hunayn ibn Ishaq, and the works of Arzachel, Jabir ibn Aflah, the Banū Mūsā, Abū Kāmil Shujā ibn Aslam, Abu al-Qasim, and Ibn al-Haytham (including the Book of Optics).

A German manuscript page teaching use of Arabic numerals (Talhoffer Thott, 1459).

Other Arabic works translated into Latin during the 12th century include the works of Muhammad ibn Jābir al-Harrānī al-Battānī and Muhammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī (including The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing), the works of Abu al-Qasim (including the al-Tasrif), Muhammad al-Fazari's Great Sindhind (based on the Surya Siddhanta and the works of Brahmagupta), the works of Razi and Avicenna (including The Book of Healing and The Canon of Medicine), the works of Averroes, the works of Thabit ibn Qurra, al-Farabi, Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Kathīr al-Farghānī, Hunayn ibn Ishaq, and his nephew Hubaysh ibn al-Hasan, the works of al-Kindi, Abraham bar Hiyya's Liber embadorum, Ibn Sarabi's (Serapion Junior) De Simplicibus, the works of Qusta ibn Luqa, the works of Maslamah Ibn Ahmad al-Majriti, Ja'far ibn Muhammad Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi, and al-Ghazali, the works of Nur Ed-Din Al Betrugi, including On the Motions of the Heavens, Ali ibn Abbas al-Majusi's medical encyclopedia, The Complete Book of the Medical Art, Abu Mashar's Introduction to Astrology, the works of Maimonides, Ibn Zezla (Byngezla), Masawaiyh, Serapion, al-Qifti, and Albe'thar. Abū Kāmil Shujā ibn Aslam's Algebra, the chemical works of Geber, and the De Proprietatibus Elementorum, an Arabic work on geology written by a pseudo-Aristotle. By the beginning of the 13th century, Mark of Toledo translated the Qur'an and various medical works.

Fibonacci presented the first complete European account of the Hindu-Arabic numeral system from Arabic sources in his Liber Abaci (1202). Al-Khazini's Zij as-Sanjari was translated into Greek by Gregory Choniades in the 13th century and was studied in the Byzantine Empire. The astronomical corrections to the Ptolemaic model made by al-Battani and Averroes and the non-Ptolemaic models produced by Mo'ayyeduddin Urdi (Urdi lemma), Nasīr al-Dīn al-Tūsī (Tusi-couple) and Ibn al-Shatir were later adapted into the Copernican heliocentric model. Al-Kindi's (Alkindus) law of terrestrial gravity influenced Robert Hooke's law of celestial gravity, which in turn inspired Newton's law of universal gravitation. Abū al-Rayhān al-Bīrūnī's Ta'rikh al-Hind and Kitab al-qanun al-Mas’udi were translated into Latin as Indica and Canon Mas’udicus respectively. Ibn al-Nafis' Commentary on Compound Drugs was translated into Latin by Andrea Alpago (d. 1522), who may have also translated Ibn al-Nafis' Commentary on Anatomy in the Canon of Avicenna, which first described pulmonary circulation and coronary circulation, and which may have had an influence on Michael Servetus, Realdo Colombo and William Harvey. Translations of the algebraic and geometrical works of Ibn al-Haytham, Omar Khayyám and Nasīr al-Dīn al-Tūsī were later influential in the development of non-Euclidean geometry in Europe from the 17th century. Ibn Tufail's Hayy ibn Yaqdhan was translated into Latin by Edward Pococke in 1671 and into English by Simon Ockley in 1708 and became "one of the most important books that heralded the Scientific Revolution." Ibn al-Baitar's Kitab al-Jami fi al-Adwiya al-Mufrada also had an influence on European botany after it was translated into Latin in 1758.

Hospitals began as Bimaristans in the Islamic world and later spread to Europe during the Crusades, inspired by the hospitals in the Middle East. The first hospital in Paris, Les Quinze-vingt, was founded by Louis IX after his return from the Crusade between 1254-1260. An important influence in European medicine were systematic and comprehensive works such as Avicenna's The Canon of Medicine, which were translated into Latin and then disseminated in manuscript and printed form throughout Europe. During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries alone, The Canon of Medicine was published more than thirty-five times. It remained a standard textbook in Europe for centuries, up until the early modern period, and introduced the contagious nature of infectious diseases, the method of quarantine, experimental medicine, and clinical trials. He also wrote The Book of Healing (actually a more general encyclopedia of science and philosophy), which became another popular textbook in Europe. Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi's Comprehensive Book of Medicine, with its introduction of measles and smallpox, was also influential in Europe. Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi's Kitab al-Tasrif was also translated to Latin and used in European medical schools for centuries.

Islamic techniques

The lute was adopted from the Arab world. 1568 print.

In the 12th century Europe owed Islam an agricultural revolution, due to the progressive introduction into Europe of various unknown fruits: the artichoke, spinachs, aubergines, peaches, apricots. Various mechanical and agricutural equipments were adopted from Islamic lands such as the noria or the windmill. Numerous new techniques in clothing, as well as new materials were also introduced: muslin, taffetas, satin, skirts. Trade mechanisms were also transmitted: tarifs, customs, bazars, magazins. Many of the music instruments used in the West also had Arab origins: the lute, the rebec, the harp.

Education

Main article: Madrasah

The first universities, namely institutions of higher education and research which issue academic degrees at all levels (bachelor, master and doctorate), were medieval Madrasahs known as Jami'ah founded in the 9th century. The University of Al Karaouine in Fez, Morocco is thus recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest degree-granting university in the world with its founding in 859 by the princess Fatima al-Fihri. The first universities in Europe were influenced in many ways by the Madrasahs in Islamic Spain and the Emirate of Sicily at the time, and in the Middle East during the Crusades.

Some of the terms and concepts now used in modern universities which have Islamic origins include "the fact that we still talk of professors holding the 'Chair' of their subject" being based on the "traditional Islamic pattern of teaching where the professor sits on a chair and the students sit around him", the term 'academic circles' being derived from the way in which Islamic students "sat in a circle around their professor", and terms such as "having 'fellows', 'reading' a subject, and obtaining 'degrees', can all be traced back" to the Islamic concepts of Ashab ("companions, as of the prophet Muhammad"), Qara'a ("reading aloud the Qur'an") and Ijazah ("license to teach") respectively. George Makdisi has listed eighteen such parallels in terminology which can be traced back to their roots in Islamic education. Some of the practices now common in modern universities which also have Islamic origins include "practices such as delivering inaugural lectures, wearing academic robes, obtaining doctorates by defending a thesis, and even the idea of academic freedom are also modelled on Islamic custom." Islamic influence was also "certainly discernible in the foundation of the first delibrately-planned university" in Europe, the University of Naples Federico II founded by Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor in 1224.

Madrasahs were also the first law schools, and it is likely that the "law schools known as Inns of Court in England" may have been derived from the Madrasahs which taught Islamic law and jurisprudence.

The origins of the doctorate dates back to the ijazat attadris wa 'l-ifttd ("license to teach and issue legal opinions") in the medieval Islamic legal education system, which was equivalent to the Doctor of Laws qualification and was developed during the 9th century after the formation of the Madh'hab legal schools. To obtain a doctorate, a student "had to study in a guild school of law, usually four years for the basic undergraduate course" and ten or more years for a post-graduate course. The "doctorate was obtained after an oral examination to determine the originality of the candidate's theses," and to test the student's "ability to defend them against all objections, in disputations set up for the purpose" which were scholarly exercises practiced throughout the student's "career as a graduate student of law." After students completed their post-graduate education, they were awarded doctorates giving them the status of faqih (meaning "master of law"), mufti (meaning "professor of legal opinions") and mudarris (meaning "teacher"), which were later translated into Latin as magister, professor and doctor respectively.

The term doctorate comes from the Latin docere, meaning "to teach", shortened from the full Latin title licentia docendi meaning "license to teach." This was translated from the Arabic term ijazat attadris, which means the same thing and was awarded to Islamic scholars who were qualified to teach. Similarly, the Latin term doctor, meaning "teacher", was translated from the Arabic term mudarris, which also means the same thing and was awarded to qualified Islamic teachers. The Latin term baccalaureus may have also been transliterated from the equivalent Arabic qualification bi haqq al-riwaya ("the right to teach on the authority of another").

The Islamic scholarly system of fatwa and ijma, meaning opinion and consensus respectively, formed the basis of the "scholarly system the West has practised in university scholarship from the Middle Ages down to the present day."

Law

Main article: Sharia

Several fundamental common law instutitions may have been adapted from similar legal instututions in Islamic law and jurisprudence, and introduced to England after the Norman conquest of England by the Normans, who conquered and inherited the Islamic legal administration of the Emirate of Sicily, and also by Crusaders during the Crusades. In particular, the "royal English contract protected by the action of debt is identified with the Islamic Aqd, the English assize of novel disseisin is identified with the Islamic Istihqaq, and the English jury is identified with the Islamic Lafif." The English trust and agency institutions in common law were possibly adapted from the Islamic Waqf and Hawala institutions respectively during the Crusades.

Other English legal institutions such as "the scholastic method, the license to teach," the "law schools known as Inns of Court in England and Madrasas in Islam" and the "European commenda" (Islamic Qirad) may have also originated from Islamic law. The methodology of legal precedent and reasoning by analogy (Qiyas) are also similar in both the Islamic and common law systems. These similarities and influences have led some scholars to suggest that Islamic law may have laid the foundations for "the common law as an integrated whole".

Several legal institutions in civil law were also adapted from similar institutions in Islamic law and jurisprudence during the Middle Ages. For example, the Islamic Hawala institution influenced the development of the Avallo in Italian civil law and the Aval in French civil law. The commenda limited partnership used in European civil law was also adapted from the Qirad and Mudaraba in Islamic law. The civil law conception of res judicata and the transfer of debt, which was not permissable under Roman law but is practiced in modern civil law, may also have origins in Islamic law. The concept of an agency was also an "institution unknown to Roman law", where it was not possible for an individual to "conclude a binding contract on behalf of another as his agent." The concept of an agency was introduced by Islamic jurists, and thus the civil law conception of agency may also have origins in Islamic law.

Islamic law also introduced "two fundamental principles to the West, on which were to later stand the future structure of law: equity and good faith", which was a precursor to the concept of pacta sunt servanda in civil law and international law. Another influence of Islamic law on the civil law tradition was the presumption of innocence, which was introduced to Europe by Louis IX of France soon after he returned from Palestine during the Crusades. Prior to this, European legal procedure consisted of either trial by combat or trial by ordeal. In contrast, Islamic law was based on the presumption of innocence from its beginning, as declared by the caliph Umar in the 7th century. The Siete Partidas of Alfonso X, which was regarded as a "monument of legal science" in the civil law tradition, was also influenced by the Islamic legal treatise Villiyet written in Islamic Spain.

Literature

Further information: Islamic literature, Arabic literature, and Persian literature

The most well known fiction from the Islamic world was The Book of One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights), which was a compilation of many earlier folk tales. The epic took form in the 10th century and reached its final form by the 14th century; the number and type of tales have varied from one manuscript to another. All Arabian fantasy tales were often called "Arabian Nights" when translated into English, regardless of whether they appeared in The Book of One Thousand and One Nights, in any version, and a number of tales are known in Europe as "Arabian Nights" despite existing in no Arabic manuscript.

"Ali Baba" by Maxfield Parrish.

This epic has been influential in the West since it was translated in the 18th century, first by Antoine Galland. Many imitations were written, especially in France. Various characters from this epic have themselves become cultural icons in Western culture, such as Aladdin, Sinbad and Ali Baba. However, no medieval Arabic source has been traced for Aladdin, which was incorporated into The Book of One Thousand and One Nights by its French translator, Antoine Galland, who heard it from an Arab Syrian Christian storyteller from Aleppo. Part of its popularity may have sprung from the increasing historical and geographical knowledge, so that places of which little was known and so marvels were plausible had to be set further "long ago" or farther "far away"; this is a process that continues, and finally culminate in the fantasy world having little connection, if any, to actual times and places. A number of elements from Arabian mythology and Persian mythology are now common in modern fantasy, such as genies, bahamuts, magic carpets, magic lamps, etc. When L. Frank Baum proposed writing a modern fairy tale that banished stereotypical elements, he included the genie as well as the dwarf and the fairy as stereotypes to go.

A famous example of Arabic poetry and Persian poetry on romance (love) is Layla and Majnun, dating back to the Umayyad era in the 7th century. It is a tragic story of undying love much like the later Romeo and Juliet, which was itself said to have been inspired by a Latin version of Layli and Majnun to an extent.

Ibn Tufail (Abubacer) and Ibn al-Nafis were pioneers of the philosophical novel. Ibn Tufail wrote the first fictional Arabic novel Hayy ibn Yaqdhan (Philosophus Autodidactus) as a response to al-Ghazali's The Incoherence of the Philosophers, and then Ibn al-Nafis also wrote a fictional novel Theologus Autodidactus as a response to Ibn Tufail's Philosophus Autodidactus. Both of these narratives had protagonists (Hayy in Philosophus Autodidactus and Kamil in Theologus Autodidactus) who were autodidactic feral children living in seclusion on a desert island, both being the earliest examples of a desert island story. However, while Hayy lives alone with animals on the desert island for the rest of the story in Philosophus Autodidactus, the story of Kamil extends beyond the desert island setting in Theologus Autodidactus, developing into the earliest known coming of age plot and eventually becoming the first example of a science fiction novel.

A Latin translation of Ibn Tufail's Hayy ibn Yaqdhan first appeared in 1671, prepared by Edward Pococke the Younger, followed by an English translation by Simon Ockley in 1708, as well as German and Dutch translations. These translations later inspired Daniel Defoe to write Robinson Crusoe, regarded as the first novel in English. Philosophus Autodidactus also inspired Robert Boyle to write his own philosophical novel set on an island, The Aspiring Naturalist. The story also anticipated Rousseau's Emile: or, On Education in some ways, and is also similar to Mowgli's story in Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book as well as Tarzan's story, in that a baby is abandoned but taken care of and fed by a mother wolf.

Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, considered the greatest epic of Italian literature, derived many features of and episodes about the hereafter directly or indirectly from Arabic works on Islamic eschatology: the Hadith and the Kitab al-Miraj (translated into Latin in 1264 or shortly before as Liber Scale Machometi, "The Book of Muhammad's Ladder") concerning Muhammad's ascension to Heaven, and the spiritual writings of Ibn Arabi. The Moors also had a noticeable influence on the works of George Peele and William Shakespeare. Some of their works featured Moorish characters, such as Peele's The Battle of Alcazar and Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, Titus Andronicus and Othello, which featured a Moorish Othello as its title character. These works are said to have been inspired by several Moorish delegations from Morocco to Elizabethan England at the beginning of the 17th century.

Philosophy

Further information: Early Islamic philosophy, Avicennism, Averroism, and Hayy ibn Yaqdhan

From Islamic Spain, the Arabic philosophical literature was translated into Hebrew, Latin, and Ladino, contributing to the development of modern European philosophy. The Jewish philosopher Moses Maimonides, Muslim sociologist-historian Ibn Khaldun, Carthage citizen Constantine the African who translated Greek medical texts, and the Muslim Al-Khwarzimi's collation of mathematical techniques were important figures of the Golden Age.

Avicenna founding his own Avicennism school of philosophy, which was influential in both Islamic and Christian lands. One of the most influential Muslim philosophers in the West was Averroes (Ibn Rushd), founder of the Averroism school of philosophy, whose works and commentaries had an impact on the rise of secular thought in Western Europe. He also developed the concept of "existence precedes essence".

Another infuential philosopher who had a significant influence on modern philosophy was Ibn Tufail. His philosophical novel, Hayy ibn Yaqdhan, translated into Latin as Philosophus Autodidactus in 1671, developed the themes of empiricism, tabula rasa, nature versus nurture, condition of possibility, materialism, and Molyneux's Problem. European scholars and writers influenced by this novel include John Locke, Gottfried Leibniz, Melchisédech Thévenot, John Wallis, Christiaan Huygens, George Keith, Robert Barclay, the Quakers, and Samuel Hartlib.

Vocabulary

Main article: Influence of Arabic on other languages

Further information: List of Arabic loanwords in English and List of Arabic star names

The adoption of the techniques and materials from the Islamic world is reflected in the origin of many of the words now in use in the Western world.

• Algebra, which comes from al-djar
• Alchemy/ Chemistry, from al kemi (الخيمياء)
• Algorithm, from the name of the scientist al-Khwarizmi
• Almanach, from al-manakh (timetables)
• Admiral, from amir al-bahr امير البحر (“Prince of the sea”)
• Avarie (French for "ship damage"), from awar ("damage")
• Carat (mass), from qīrāṭ (قيراط) ("mass")
• Baldaquin, from a tissue material made in Baghdad.
• Coffee, from Kahwa
• Camphor, from kafur
• Amber, from al-anbar
• Artichoke, from al-karchouf
• Chiffre (French for "number"), from sifr (meaning "zero")
• Cotton, from koton
• Sugar, from soukkar
• Magazin, from makhâzin
• Mate (as in "Checkmate"), from mât ("Death")
• Hazard, from az-zahr (game of dice)
• Orange, from nârandj
• Lacquer, from lakk
• Lute, from al-ud
• Racket, from râhat (palm of the hand)
• Sorbet, from sharab

See also

• Latin translations of the 12th century
• Islamic Golden Age
• Islamic science: Influence on European science
• Sharia: Classical Islamic law
• Madrasah: Universities and colleges

References

• Lebedel, Claude, "Les Croisades, origines et conséquences", 2006, Editions Ouest-France, ISBN 2737341361
• Roux, Jean-Paul, "Les explorateurs au Moyen-Age", Hachette, 1985, ISBN 2012793398
• Lewis, Bernard, "Les Arabes dans l'histoire", 1993, Flammarion, ISBN 2080813625