Roger Bacon, also known by the scholastic accolade Doctor Mirabilis, was a polymath, a medieval English philosopher, scientist, theologian and Franciscan friar who placed considerable emphasis on the study of nature through empiricism. Intertwining his Catholic faith with scientific thinking, Roger Bacon is considered one of the greatest polymaths of the medieval period.
The Hermetica are texts attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth. These texts may vary widely in content and purpose, but by modern convention are usually subdivided into two main categories, the "technical" and "religio-philosophical" Hermetica.
The Organon is the standard collection of Aristotle's six works on logical analysis and dialectic. The name Organon was given by Aristotle's followers, the Peripatetics, who maintained against the Stoics that Logic was "an instrument" of Philosophy.
The Emerald Tablet, the Smaragdine Table, or the Tabula Smaragdina is a compact and cryptic Hermetic text. It was a highly regarded foundational text for many Islamic and European alchemists. Though attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus, the text of the Emerald Tablet first appears in a number of early medieval Arabic sources, the oldest of which dates to the late eighth or early ninth century. It was translated into Latin several times in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Numerous interpretations and commentaries followed.
Abu Ma‘shar al-Balkhi, Latinized as Albumasar, was an early Persian Muslim astrologer, thought to be the greatest astrologer of the Abbasid court in Baghdad. While he was not a major innovator, his practical manuals for training astrologers profoundly influenced Muslim intellectual history and, through translations, that of western Europe and Byzantium.
John of Seville was one of the main translators from Arabic into Castilian in partnership with Dominicus Gundissalinus during the early days of the Toledo School of Translators. John of Seville translated a litany of Arabic astrological works in addition to being credited with the production of several original works in Latin.
Māshāʾallāh ibn Atharī, known as Mashallah, was an 8th century Persian Jewish astrologer, astronomer, and mathematician. Originally from Khorasan, he lived in Basra during the reigns of the Abbasid caliphs al-Manṣūr and al-Ma’mūn, and was among those who introduced astrology and astronomy to Baghdad. The bibliographer ibn al-Nadim described Mashallah "as virtuous and in his time a leader in the science of jurisprudence, i.e. the science of judgments of the stars". Mashallah served as a court astrologer for the Abbasid caliphate and wrote works on astrology in Arabic. Some Latin translations survive.
Pseudo-Aristotle is a general cognomen for authors of philosophical or medical treatises who attributed their works to the Greek philosopher Aristotle, or whose work was later attributed to him by others. Such falsely attributed works are known as pseudepigrapha. The term Corpus Aristotelicum covers both the authentic and spurious works of Aristotle.
Latin translations of the 12th century were spurred by a major search by European scholars for new learning unavailable in western Europe at the time; their search led them to areas of southern Europe, particularly in central Spain and Sicily, which recently had come under Christian rule following their reconquest in the late 11th century. These areas had been under Muslim rule for a considerable time, and still had substantial Arabic-speaking populations to support their search. The combination of this accumulated knowledge and the substantial numbers of Arabic-speaking scholars there made these areas intellectually attractive, as well as culturally and politically accessible to Latin scholars. A typical story is that of Gerard of Cremona, who is said to have made his way to Toledo, well after its reconquest by Christians in 1085, because he:
arrived at a knowledge of each part of [philosophy] according to the study of the Latins, nevertheless, because of his love for the Almagest, which he did not find at all amongst the Latins, he made his way to Toledo, where seeing an abundance of books in Arabic on every subject, and pitying the poverty he had experienced among the Latins concerning these subjects, out of his desire to translate he thoroughly learnt the Arabic language.
The Toledo School of Translators is the group of scholars who worked together in the city of Toledo during the 12th and 13th centuries, to translate many of the Islamic philosophy and scientific works from Classical Arabic into Medieval Latin.
The Kitāb al-Ḥayawān is an Arabic translation of treatises of Aristotle's:
During the High Middle Ages, the Islamic world was an important contributor to the global cultural scene, innovating and supplying information and ideas to Europe, via Al-Andalus, Sicily and the Crusader kingdoms in the Levant. These included Latin translations of the Greek Classics and of Arabic texts in astronomy, mathematics, science, and medicine. Translation of Arabic philosophical texts into Latin "led to the transformation of almost all philosophical disciplines in the medieval Latin world", with a particularly strong influence of Muslim philosophers being felt in natural philosophy, psychology and metaphysics. Other contributions included technological and scientific innovations via the Silk Road, including Chinese inventions such as paper, compass and gunpowder.
Alchemy in the medieval Islamic world refers to both traditional alchemy and early practical chemistry by Muslim scholars in the medieval Islamic world. The word alchemy was derived from the Arabic word كيمياء or kīmiyāʾ and may ultimately derive from the ancient Egyptian word kemi, meaning black.
Robert Steele (1860–1944) was a British scholar, best known for editing between c. 1905 and 1941 the 16-volume Opera hactenus inedita Rogeri Bacon.
Yaḥyā ibn al-Biṭrīq was an Assyrian scholar who pioneered the translation of ancient Greek texts into Arabic, a major early figure in the Graeco-Arabic translation movement under the Abbasid empire. He translated for Al-Ma'mun the major medical works of Galen and Hippocrates, and also translated Ptolemy Tetrabiblos.
Liber physiognomiae is a work by the Scottish mathematician, philosopher, and scholar Michael Scot concerning physiognomy; the work is also the final book of a trilogy known as the Liber introductorius. The Liber physiognomiae itself is divided into three sections, which deal with various concepts like procreation, generation, dream interpretation, and physiognomy proper.
Philip of Tripoli, sometimes Philippus Tripolitanus or Philip of Foligno, was an Italian Catholic priest and translator. Although he had a markedly successful clerical career, his most enduring legacy is his translation of the complete Pseudo-Aristotelian Secretum secretorum from Arabic into Latin around 1230.
Guyof Valence was a bishop of Tripoli whose episcopate probably fell in the period 1228–1237. He is an obscure figure, whose name is known only from the prologue of Philip of Tripoli's Latin translation of the Pseudo-Aristotelian Secretum secretorum, in which he dedicates the work "to his most excellent lord Guido, originally of Valence, glorious pontiff of the city of Tripoli, most strenuous in the cultivation of the Christian religion."
Moses ben Elijah Galina was a Jewish pseudoscientific writer and translator from Candia.
Alexander the Great was the king of the Kingdom of Macedon and the founder of an empire that stretched from Greece to northwestern India. Legends surrounding his life quickly sprung up soon after his own death. His predecessors represented him in their coinage as the son of Zeus Ammon, wearing what would become the Horns of Alexander as originally signified by the Horns of Ammon. Legends of Alexander's exploits coalesced into the third-century Alexander Romance which, in the premodern period, went through over one hundred recensions, translations, and derivations and was translated into almost every European vernacular and every language of the Islamic world. After the Bible, it was the most popular form of European literature. It was also translated into every language from the Islamicized regions of Asia and Africa, from Mali to Malaysia.
