The Hazardous Journey of Ibn Al Haytam- A I Sabra

The "Commentary" That Saved the Text. The Hazardous Journey of Ibn al-Haytham's Arabic"Optics"Author(s): A. I. SabraSource: Early Science and Medicine, Vol. 12, No. 2 (2007), pp. 117-133Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20617660 .Accessed: 30/09/2014 12:24

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Early Science and

/ /6 S 3 ' % Medicine B RI L L Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 www.brill.nl/esm

The "Commentary" That Saved the Text. The Hazardous Journey of Ibn al-Haytham's

Arabic Optics

A.I. Sabra* Harvard University

In Memoriam David E. Pingree 1933-2005

Abstract The "Text" and the "Commentary" mentioned in the title of this essay are, respec tively, the Kitdb al-Mandizr, or Optics, of al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham, composed in the first half of the fifth/eleventh century, and the Tanqih al-Manazir li-dhawi /-absdr wa /-basd'ir, written by Abui I-Hasan (or al-Hasan) Kamal al-Din al-Fdrisi in the second half of the seventh/thirteenth century. It is known that, so far, only the first five of the seven maqd1dt/Books that make up the Arabic text of IH's Optics have been pub lished, and that the Tanqi4 was published in two volumes. I shall be concerned with certain episodes in the lives of these two works, my aim being to shed light on their transmission within the Islamic Arabic and Persian worlds.

Keywords Ibn al-Haytham, Optics of Ibn al-Haytham, Kamal al-Din al-Farisi, Tanqik al-Manazir, Nasir al-Din al-Tisi, optical refraction, Qutb al-Din al-Shirazl, al-Mu'taman ibn Had, plagues

*} Harvard University, Department of the History of Science, , website: http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/^sabra. A shorter version of this essay was read at a conference arranged by the Manuscripts

Centre, The Library of Alexandria, on "Manuscript Commentaries," March 7-9, 2006. My thanks are due to Ramy Al-Gamal for presenting my essay in my absence.

I am grateful to Jamil Ragep, Elaheh Kheirandish and Hussein Ma sum! for giving me access to photographs of manuscripts in Istanbul and Iran. As always, I am

indebted to libraries in Iran, Turkey and Europe for supplying microfilms of manu

scripts in their possession.

? Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2007 DOI: 10.1163/157338207X194668


118 A.I. Sabra /Early3 Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

I. The Problem Posed

I.1. The "Text" and the "Commentary" mentioned in the title of this essay are, respectively, the Kitdb al-Mandzir, or Optics, of al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham, composed in the first half of the fifth/eleventh century, and the Tanqik al-Mandzir li-dhawi 1-absyr wa 1-basair, written by Abu I-Hasan (or al-Hasan) Kamal al-Din al-Farisi in the second half of the seventh/thirteenth century. (From here on I shall refer to Ibn al-Hay tham as IH and to Kamdl al-Din as KD.) It is known that, so far, only the first five of the seven maqd/dt/Books that make up the Arabic text of IH's Optics have been published (Kuwait, 1983, 2002), and that the Tanqik was published in two volumes (Hyderabad-Dn, 1347/1928, 1348/1930). 1I shall be concerned with certain episodes in the lives of these two works, my aim being to shed light on their transmission

within the Islamic Arabic and Persian worlds, and leaving out of my consideration the journey and the reception of the Optics in Europe, which appears to have occurred-first, in the late eleventh century (see below: IV.4), and again, perhaps, in the late twelfth or the early thir teenth century AD.

1.2. All extant Arabic manuscripts of the Optics became widely known to exist after Max Krause had published a complete list of them in 1936;2 they all were then, and still are now, kept in Istanbul librar ies. When the Egyptian physicist Mustafa Nazif published his great study, in Arabic, of IH's works on light and vision in 1942, 1943,3 he had access to copies of all of those manuscripts with the exception of

1} Al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks I-II-III, Fi l-Ibs?r 'ala ?-istiqama. Edition by A.I. Sabra ofthe Arabie text (Kuwait: NCCAL, 1983, repr. 2006); The

Optics of Ibn al-Haytham, Bks I-III, On Direct Vision, translated and with Introduc

tion and Commentary by A.I. Sabra, 2 vols. (London, 1989); Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks

IV-V, On Reflection and Images Seen by Reflection, edition of the Arabic text in two

volumes by A.I. Sabra (Kuwait: NCCAL, 2002); Kam?l al-D?n Abu 1-Hasan al-F?ris?,

Tanqih al-Man?zir li-dhaw? l-abs?r wa l-bas?'ir, 2 vols. (Hyderabad Dn (India):

Dairat al-Ma arif al-'Uthm?niyya, 1347-1348/1928-1930). 2) Max Krause, "Stambuler Handschriften islamischer Mathematiker," Quellen und

Studien zur Geschichte der Mathematik, Astronomie und Physik, Abteilung B: Studien,

Band 3, Heft 4 (Berlin, 1936), see especially 474-79. 3) Mustafa Naz?f, al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham, buh?thuhu wa kush?fuhu al-basariyya, 2

vols with continuous pagination (Cairo: Fu ?d 1st University, 1942, 1943). For a list

ofthe manuscripts used of Kit?b al-Man?zir in this book, see vol. I: m-n.


A.LI Sabra /Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 119

the incomplete Kdpriili MS 952 which, however, later proved criti cally valuable in editing Book IV and, especially, Book V in 2002 AD.4 Nazif also used the Tanqik, but only in the far from satisfactory Hyder abad edition which frequently disappointed him.5

1.3. For reasons that will soon become clear we shall begin with KD (Kamal al-Din). He must have already developed a serious interest in

mathematics and optics when, as a student of Qutb al-Din al-Shirdzi (d. 710/131 1) at Tabriz, he desired to embark on a substantial project in these fields. For example, it seems that al-Shirdzi had first planned to help his student to write a commentary on Apollonius's Conics,

which is not a book for beginners. And, with regard to optics, KD told al-Shiraz! that he had failed to find a single convincing account of optical refraction in the works of scholars in his time, including "leaders" in the field of the mathematicl sciences.6 As we shall see, KD actually specified that whenever optical refraction was mentioned in the works he consulted, the angles of incidence, reflection and refrac tion were wrongly presented in diagrams as being all equal to one another-like this:

shining point

ang/l,>V~14 \\, A, MaX>^w

o\ ete~x,';~"' ~NJ~I~of flat surface

As reported by KamrM al-Din to Qutb al-Din al-Shirdzi MS Ahmet III 3340

4) Ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks IV-V, Introduction, 6*-7*, 9*-10*. 5) See, for example, Naz?f, al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham, 496-97, note 1. 6) For an English translation ofthe full conversation, see below, Appendix.


120 A.I. Sabra /Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

1.4. Now, this report, delivered by KD in very polite language to a senior scholar who was also his mentor, is very surprising. After all, IH (Ibn al-Haytham), in Book VII of his Optics, had presented a clear, definitely advanced, and rather sophisticated theory of refraction and of vision by refraction. One would therefore expect that such a book and a theory, launched in the first half of the fifth/eleventh century, would have been well known to scholars of the ranks of those associ ated with the famous Observatory established at Mardgha by the Mon gols in Azerbaijan shortly after the fall of Baghdad in 657/1259, and first directed by Nasir al-Din al-Tu-s! (d. 672/1274) and after him by Qutb al-Din al-Shirdzi (d. 710/1311). But the fact is that we have no indication anywhere that al-Tu-si, for example, who knew Euclid's Optics, and who helped to publicize it widely in his own book for stu dents of astronomy, Kitdb al-Mutawassitdt, had ever read or seen the Optics of IH (or of Ptolemy) a fact that obviously lends support to KD's unhappy report.

1.5. It is true that some Arabic-writing scholars, biographers and scribes who lived between the middle of the fifth/eleventh century and close to the end of the seventh/thirteenth century undoubtedly knew of IH's Optics, or even of some features of its contents. A prominent example of this is Fakhr al-Din al-Rdzi (d. 606/1209). In his Qur'anic al- Tafsir al-kabir he refers in one sentence to "the book of 'Abu 'Ali Ibn al-Haytham,' calling it al-Mandzir al-kaththa (the thick/large Optics)." And again, in his Persian Jdmi' al- 'u/rm, al-RPzi lists the names of the visible properties/qualities (al-ma'dni al-mubsara/intentiones visibiles) enumerated in Bk. II of IH's work.7 But no one in that whole period of more than two hundred years is known to have possessed any substan tive knowledge of the book's fundamental theses and arguments,8 let

7) For R?z?'s al-Tafs?r al-kab?r li l-Im?m Fakhr al-D?n al-Raz?, see: al-Juz al-th?lith

cashar (Cairo: Iltiz?m 'Abd al-Rahman Muhammad, 1938), 96.1 owe the information

concerning al-R?z?'s J?m? al-Ul?m (Tehran: Kit?bkh?nah-i Asad?, 1346/1967-68), 174, to Dr. Elaheh Kheirandish, who showed me photographs ofthe relevant pages. 8) A witness from the eighth/fourteenth century is Sal?h al-D?n al-Safad? (d. 764/1363),

who tells us, in his al-W?fi bi-1-Wafay?t, vol. XI (Wiesbaden, 1981), 420-23, that he saw "in Egypt" an "old" copy of Ibn al-Haytham's Optics in "seven volumes." See The

Optics of Ibn al-Haytham, Bks I-II-III, Introduction, xxxi, note 30.


A.I Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 121

alone showing anything as detailed, ordered and sophisticated as we find in KD's Tanq4' al-Mandzir.

It would thus appear that the mathematical and experimental study of light and vision, which IH had raised up to new heights in his Optics, fell into obscurity some time notfar after his death which occurred in or shortly after 432/1040-41.9

1.6. The advice which al-Shirdzi gave to KD is also significant. He told his student that, "in his youth," he had "seenlra'd", not read, in a library he did not name "in Persia," a book on optics 'in two large vol umes" attributed to "Ibn al-Haytham;" and al-Shirdzi promised to do his best to obtain "the book" for KD's use as a commentator.10

1.7. Some time after that discussion, al-Shirazi presented the anx iously hopeful KD with what must have been a complete text of JH's Optics which he had managed to obtain from, he said, "a very distant

9) A.I. Sabra, "One Ibn al-Haytham or Two? An Exercise in Reading the Bio-Biblio

graphical Sources," in Zeitschrift f?r Geschichte der arabisch-islamischen Wissenschaften, 12 (1998), 1-50; and "Conclusion," ibid., 15(2002/2003), 95-108, esp. 97-98. 10) In his Nih?yat al-idr?k fi dir?yat al-afl?k (MS Ahmet III 3333, 162 fols., tran scribed in 738/1337-38), al-Sh?r?z? quotes a reference by IH to his own book of

Optics, in what al-Sh?r?z? called a tdl?q, or note, concerned with the problem of see

ing the stars. Al-Sh?r?z? then adds that he had not come across that book ("wa lam

yaqd ilayy dh?lika l-Kit?b"... fol. 40b).?The tdl?q was in fact the last note in an

exchange of letters between IH and an astronomer named Ibn Md?n, concerning IH's psychological explanation of the apparent magnification of celestial bodies near

the horizon. For the full text and translation of this important discussion, see: A.I.

Sabra, "On Seeing the Stars, n: Ibn al-Haytham's Answers' to the 'Doubts' Raised by Ibn Mad?n," in Zeitschrift f?r Geschichte der arabisch-islamischen Wissenschaften, 10 (1995/1996), 1-59, esp. 30-31 (Arabic), and 46 (English translation).?The part of the tdl?q referred to by al-Sh?r?z? consists of the last few lines in the final letter to Ibn

Mad?n, as follows: "I have explained this matter in my book on Optics in the discus

sion of refraction, where I showed that the magnification of the stars on the horizon

has a universal cause other than the vapour, on account of which [cause] the stars and

their mutual distances are seen to be larger on the horizon than in the middle of the

sky or high above the horizon. [There] I showed, moreover, that the vapour on the

horizon increases the magnification beyond that due to the universal cause; but I have

not mentioned this to you [in my previous letter] because it is not one of your doubts

nor [would] the answer to it [be] an answer to your questions" p. 46 in the

1995/1996 publication. The colophon of MS Ahmet III 3333 notes that the author (al-musannif) had com

pleted the Nih?ya in Sha ban, 680/1281-82.


122 A.I Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

land/country" (min aqyd l-bildd). Let us call 'X' this version which formed the single basis for the project which KD undertook in the Tanq4'. In some relatively late manuscripts of the Tanqik we read that

X was written in IH's own hand ("bi-khatt Ibn al-Haytham"), but not all manuscripts have this particular phrase, and I think that it was very likely added in some late copies of the Tanqik."1 We can tell at any rate that X, whose fate in or after KD's life-time is utterly unknown to us,

must have been a carefully written manuscript which also included a fair number of carefully drawn diagrams.

II. The Manuscripts of Ibn al-Haytham's Arabic Optics

11.1. This inquiry was not primarily concerned with the important question of why Kitdb al-Mandzir had been so little known and, very likely, not even read and adequately understood in the Middle East for more than two centuries, though the book, which almost certainly reached Saragossa in the late fifth/eleventh century, and later came to be known and examined by philosophers and mathematicians in Europe in Latin translation, also made in Spain, perhaps early in the thirteenth century AD-or, at any rate, close to the middle of the thir teenth century. 2 -But, once that question was posed, it dominated a large part of this essay.

11.2. Let us, then, turn to the extant, and mutually independent, manuscript copies of the seven Books/Maqildt that make up the whole Arabic Kitab al-Mandzir. They can be concisely grouped for our pur pose in three categories as follows:

A: Bks I-III and Bks VI-VII, all written by the hand of Ahmad b. Muhammad b. Ja'far al-'Askari, said to be a relative of IH's by marriage

n) See: Kit?b al-Man?zir, I-II-III, Introduction, 44; English translation, vol. II,

Introduction, lxxi, note 114; and al-Man?zir, IV-V, Introduction, 16*. 12) Much has been written about the reception and appropriation of Ibn al-Haytham's

Optics in Europe, but we still do not know exactly when, where and by whom the text

was translated into Latin. The earliest extant Latin manuscripts, seventeen of which

are complete or nearly so, were transcribed in the thirteenth century; and the earliest

among these is taken to be MS Cr3.3, now in the Crawford Library at the Edinburgh

Royal Observatory; it is dated 1269. See A. Mark Smith, Alhacen's Theory of Visual

Perception, I: Introduction and Latin Text [Bks I-II-III] (Philadelphia, 2001), civ if.


A.I. Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 123

(sihr al-musannif), and all of them transcribed at Basra in the period between the middle of Jumada I, 476/1083 and the middle of Ramadan, 476/1084.13

B: Bks IV-V, copied in Jumada II, 636/1239 from the two, now-lost MSS of the same two Books that had formed part of the set of volumes written by the hand of al-'Askari. (Note the jump of 155 to 156 years.)

C: The incomplete, but important MS K6priilii 952: 135 large folios, in Maghribi hand or hands, containing extensive parts of Bks IV-V-VI-VII, transcribed in the 8th/14th century (according to Max Krause), or in the 7th/13th century (according to Ramadan besen).14 See below, section IV.4.

II.3. We shall 'focus first on B, containing Bks IV-V, which, as M. Nazif has observed, were copied from the complete 'Askari version of Kitdb al-Mandzir. It is quite clear, as Nazif has also noted, that the rea son for discarding Bks IV-V in the 'Askari version was that they had been damaged to some extent, apparently by water and in some places by ink spots;15 and the scribe was aiming to sell his newly gathered vol umes, (namely B), together with A, which (we may assume), he pos sessed, as a Complete Set of the whole of Kitdb al-Mandzir.

11.4. We are now in a position to take the next important step in our story. We know that the Complete Set A+B (call it: CS) was finally moved to Istanbul (exactly when?); but we ask: 'to whom was it first sold?' Fortunately, we know the answer. The title-pages of the seven volumes that make up CS carry the names of people who may have owned or looked at them at one time or another. But one name, prom inently displayed at the top of every title-page of the seven books/vol

13) For more information, especially regarding the dates ofthe manuscripts in al-Askarfs

hand, see: Ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks I-II-III, Introduction, 38-43; Eng lish transi.: vol. II, Introduction, lxxx-lxxxvii; and Bks IV-V, Arabic text, Introduc

tion, 5*-10*. 14) It should be noted that my edition of B (Books IV-V, in Arabic; and in English, now in preparation) takes into account all variant readings in C, and selected additions

from the Tanqlh, without confusing these readings with one another or with Ibn al

Haytham's own text as presented in the Arabic edition.?What still needs to be done

by someone is a better edition of the Tanq?h. 15) Ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks IV-V, Introduction, 9*-10*, 17*-18*.


124 A.I Sabra /Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

umes, appears to be the name of the intended buyer after the addition of the newly transcribed Bks IV and V. The name is "Yahyd ibn Muhammad ibn al-Lubufdi," whom I proposed tentatively in 1983 to identify with Najm al-Din Yahyd b. Muhammad b. 'Adnan b. 'Abd al

Wahid al-Lubfidi, who is said by Ibn Abi Usaybi'a to have been born in Aleppo in 607/1210-11 and died after 666/1267-8, and who served al-Malik al-Mansur, ruler of Hims (637/1239-643/1245), first as a physician and then as a wazir.16 My first identification has gained sup port after the publication by George Saliba in 1990 of Kitdb al-Hay'a by Mu'ayyad al-Din al-'Urdi (d. 664/1266) who, like al-Lubtdi, also served al-Malik al-Manspur before departing to Maragha, probably shortly after 1259, to work at the Mardgha Observatoy as an expert instrument maker.-It was clear to me from certain passages in al 'Urdi's book that he must have looked at IH's Optics, which (I assume) he would have been able to read (at Hims?) in the Complete Set CS before departing for Syria.17

16) Ibn Ab? Usaybi'a, Tabaq?t al-atibba, ed. August M?ller, 2 vols. (Cairo-K?nigs

berg, 1882-1884), II: 185-89; Ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks I-II-III, Intro

duction, 38-39. 17) See Mu ayyad al-D?n al-'Urd?, Kit?b al-Haya, ed. G. Saliba, 1990: Markaz Dir?s?t

al-Wahda al-'Arabiyya, Beirut. Ibn al-Haytham's name is mentioned in this book

twice in astronomical contexts (214, 338), but there can be no doubt that al-'Urd?

was familiar with at least parts of Kit?b al-Man?zir despite the total absence of explicit reference to it. For example, on p. 139, al-'Urd? adopts IH's explanation of sight's

perception of the convex shape of a visible surface; on pp. 140, 143, he uses

mutaf?wit, the adjective introduced by IH as a technical name for a disproportion

ately long or short distance; and on p. 147, he uses al-adwa al-thaw?n?, secondary

lights, to name the lights emanating from illuminated opaque objects (as distin

guished from lights emanating directly from self-luminous objects, such as the sun or

a torch).?Moreover, in a chapter "On Dawn and Twilight" (pp. 322-37) al-Urd?

borrows the term al-bayt al-muzlim (i.e. camera obscura), first mentioned by IH in the

Optics (p. 324). And, in the same chapter he reaffirms propositions established experi

mentally by IH, such as the weakening/reduction (ddf) of light by being reflected, and by receding from the light's source or from the reflecting surface (p. 325).?Al

Urd?, however, says nothing about IH's theory in Optics, Bk VII, concerning the

apparent magnification of celestial bodies at or near the horizon?a phenomenon

especially interesting to astronomers, nor does he mention the phenomenon itself!

This raises the question of whether al-cUrd? actually read that part of IH's book, which particularly aroused the curiosity of some other astronomers including Qutb


A I. Sabra /Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 125

III. Back to Kamil al-Din's Tanqi

111.1. Returning now to KD's Commentary/Tanqik we begin with some relevant observations. The Commentary was written before 708/1309, the year in which KD completed a much shorter treatise based on it, and titled Kitdb al-Basd'irft 'i/m al-mandzir-which has survived.'8 The Tanqi4 is presently known to exist in at least fifteen manuscript copies kept in libraries in Istanbul, Iran, India, Leiden, Jerusalem, Russia, and New York."9 A number of these fifteen manuscripts are incomplete, and at least nine of them are from the 11th/17th century. Four are undated, including the Leiden University MS Or.20 1. The best MS in the whole lot clearly appears to be the one now preserved at the Ahmet III Library, no. 3340, in the Topkapi Saray Museum in Istanbul: it was transcribed at Nisdbar in 716/1316, in the lifetime of KD who is said to have died on 19 Dhi l-Qa'da, 718/12 January 1319, at Tabriz, at the age of fifty-three lunar years. -The Hyderabad edition of the Tanqik, based on two MSS (Bankipore, The Public Library, MSS 2455, 2456) from the seventeenth and the eighteenth century respectively, claims to have been also "checked" against the Leiden MS, but this claim is not exactly confirmed by the printed Hyderabad text, or by the many deficient geometrical diagrams newly drawn and published in it.

111.2. I have no knowledge that any interested scholar actually uti lized or made direct contact with the Complete Set, namely CS, after al-'Urd! had left Syria for Maragha (already in AD 1259?), or after CS had been moved to Istanbul (exactly when?), and until M. Krause published his list of IH's Istanbul manuscripts in 1936, and also until

al-D?n al-Sh?r?z?.?See A.I. Sabra, "Configuring the Universe: Aporetic, Problem

Solving, and Kinematic Modeling as Themes of Arabic Astronomy," Perspectives on

Science, 6 (1999), 288-330, esp. 307, n. 24. 18) See Ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks. IV-V, Introduction, 12*-13*; see also

M. Mawaldi, L'Alg?bre de Kam?l al-D?n al-F?risv. ?dition critique, analyse math?ma

tique et ?tude critique, 3 vols. (Aleppo, 1989), especially the photograph in vol. I of the last page in MS Sipahsalar 554, containing information about Kam?l al-D?n's

dates; an edition of Kit?b al-Basair based on this MS is being prepared by Dr. Mawaldi.

19) For a list of the known manuscripts of the Tanqih see Ibn al-Haytham, Kit?b al

Man?zir, Bks IV-V, Introduction, 11*-12*. 20) Kit?b al-Man?zir, Bks IV-V, Introduction, 11*-16*.


126 A. I Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

M. Nazif published his two-volume study of 1942-1943.-We do know, however, that, in the ninth/fifteenth and the tenth/sixteenth century, two significant, somewhat detailed accounts of IH's Optics were com

posed-not, however, on the basis of manuscripts of any part of IHs book itself but only on the basis of KDs Tanqlh. To my knowledge neither one of these two extant accounts has been published.

111.3. The first of those two accounts was appended by Mulla Fathallah Shirwani (d. 891/1486) to his own Commentary on Nasir al Din al-T usi's astronomical Kitab al- Tdhkira, as a substantial Appendix (Tadhnib) (58 fols in MS Ahmet III 3314) which, he recognized, was urgently needed as an explanation of vision and a description of the behaviour of light in reflection and refraction-"all of this," Shirwa-ni said, being taken from Ibn al-Haytham's Optics as presented in the Tanqik by Kamal al-Din al-Hasan [sic] al-Farisi (MS Ahmet III 3314, p. 43b). In his clear, correct and rich account, Shirwani also makes use of separate treatises by IH: "On Light," "On Seeing the Stars," "On Shadows," (all of them now extant), and on the apparent magnifica tion of celestial magnitudes near the horizon. Moreover, Shirwani fre quently compares IH's views with those of Qutb al-Din al-Shirazi in his Nihdyat al-idrdk, and of al-Shirazi's contemporary Nizam al-Din al Nisabiri (d. AD 1329?), and others.21

111.4. The second account, a book of 84 folios, titled Nfir hadaqat al-ibsydr wa nfir hadiqat al-anzdr, is extant only in a single manuscript written by the hand of the author, Taqiyy al-Din ibn Ma'rcff (d. 993/1585), and completed in early 982/1574-75, with a dedication to the Ottoman Sultan Murad III (982/1574-1003/1595) (Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Marsh 119). As A. Sayili has remarked, Taqiyy al-Din had been a judge in Cairo before he left for the Ottoman capi tal, where he was soon appointed head astronomer, in 979/1571-72, to be later charged with supervising the construction of the ill-fated Istan bul Observatory which was "completed" in AD 1577 and, quoting Otto Kurz, proved to be a last "frustration" in the life of Ibn Ma'ruif's by

21) I am grateful to Hussein Ma sum? and Jamil Ragep, respectively, for photographs of

Sh?rw?n?'s Tadhnib in MS 493 in The Central Library of Tehran University, and in

Topkapi Saray MS Ahmet III 3314. I also consulted a partial transcription by the late

Anton Heinen from a manuscript in a private collection at Lahore.


A.I. Sabra /Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 127

being demolished in early 1580 by the Sultan's order or, at any rate, with his authorization.22

111.5. As in the 9th/15th-century case of Shirwani's Tadhnib, Ibn Ma'raf's book is an ordered, new exposition based largely on IH's theory of vision in the three modes of the behaviour of light-recti linear propagation, reflection and refraction. Unlike Shirwdni's exposi tion, Ibn Ma'rif's book does not show acquaintance with other optical

writings of Ibn al-Haytham's. As the last substantial Arabic account of light and vision, written shortly before the century of "the scientific revolution," the book obviously merits to be made accessible in a scien tific edition.

IV. Some Conclusions, Briefly Stated

Unless and until further evidence to the contrary comes to light, we are led to propose the following conclusions:

IV. 1. We have no Arabic texts or reports concerning Arabic texts, in the Middle East, that represented or referred to substantial studies of IH's Optics in the period between IH's death (in or after 432/1040-41) and the composition of KD's Tanqi{, probably not too long before the beginning of the year 708/1309-see above, 111. 1.

IV.2. In the following section V, I present a complete translation of a well-known passage in Ibn Abi 'Usaybi'a's Tabaqdt al-atibbd' that strongly suggests a tentative answer, which is obviously worth pursu ing, to the question "What went wrong?" in this particular case of

what we might call 'decline'. It is obvious in any case that exploring this question might well produce a definite contribution to under standing a conspicuous, though relatively short-lived decline of a whole field of scientific research that had achieved a remarkable progress in

22) For the unfortunate Istanbul Observatory and the "frustrated" Ibn Mar?f, see Aydin

Sayih, The Observatory in Islam and its Place in the General History ofthe Observatory (Ankara: Publications of the Turkish Historical Society, series vii, no. 30, 1960;

reprinted, New York, 1981), 289-305. See O. Kurz, European Clocks and Watches in

the Near East (London and Leiden, 1975), 49-51. Both works note earlier essential

studies on the subjects and events involved. See also the article on Taqiyy al-D?n by D. A. King in The Encyclopaedia of Islam, New Edition, vol. X (2000), 132-33.


128 Al. Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 11,7-133

the first half of the fifth/eleventh century. It is also clear that there is a lesson to be learned from the remarkably wide step taken by a single scholar, Kamal al-Din, which however cannot be explored here.

IV.3. We are of course indebted to Qutb al-Din al-Shirazi for his successful effort to obtain "the book" which he "had not read," as he clearly revealed in his conversation with KD, and as he had also writ ten in his own astronomical work, Nihdyat al-idrdkfi dirdyat al-aflk/ The Ultimate Perception for Understanding the Celestial Orbs.23

IV.4. So far as we know, all acknowledgements of the contents of IH's Optics that circulated in Arabic in the Middle East, from the late sev enth/thirteenth century until the publications of Mustafa Nazif in the fourteenth/twentieth century, were derived directly or indirectly from KD's Tanqiz, and, perhaps also to a small extent, from KD's own sum mary of the Tanqi4 in his Kitdb al-Basd'irfi 'ilm al-mandzir (completed in 708/1308-09; the extant, apparently unique copy of al-Basd'ir, MS Sipahsalar 554 is dated 731/1331).

IV.5. We are faced with a mystery posed by MS K6priili 952. As we have noted, this MS is written in a Maghribi hand or hands, which may be significant, being (as far as is known to me) the only manu script of a work of IH's that has turned up in the Middle East in a

Maghribi script. In its present state, MS Kbpriill 952, which is defi nitely independent of CS, lacks Books 1-11-111 which at one time were part of it.24 It would be useful to know exactly where and when it was done.

IV.6. We do know for certain that at least an important part of Bk V of IH's Optics did reach Spain in the late eleventh century AD, where it was used by the distinguished mathematician al-Mu'taman ibn Huid, ruler of Saragossa from 1081 to 1085 AD.25 There is nothing to prevent us from exploring whether Ibn Hfid might have in fact obtained a

23) Sabra, "One Ibn al-Haytham or Two?" and "Conclusion," see p. 121, n. 9.

24) See Ibn al-Haytham, al-Man?zir, Bks IV-V, Introduction, 6*-7*. 25) See J.P. Hogendijk, "Al-Mutaman's Simplified Lemmas for Solving Alhazen's prob

lem'," in From Baghdad to Barcelona: Studies in the Islamic Exact Sciences in Honour of

Prof. Juan Vernet, ed. Joseph Carulleras and Julio Sams?, 2 vols. (Barcelona, 1996), II:

59-101. Further research is needed to support Hogendijk's "conclusion" that al

Mu taman ibn H?d used, not the text of Ibn al-Haytham's Optics itself, but a "revised"

version of it.



copy of the whole book, which is much more likely than obtaining only a part of it; and whether the "twelfth-" or "thirteeth"-century Latin translation(s) were in fact based on Ibn Hfid's original copy or on a descendant or descendants of it.

V. A Question

Can we "blame" the situation described below by the physician Ibn Butlan for the picture we have drawn of the journey of Ibn al-Hay tham's Optics in the Middle East? If we go in this direction, then, undoubtedly, we will have taken a step forward in a constructive "game" of genuine historical research.

VI. Ibn Butlkns Testimony

Following is a Translation of the passage quoted by Ibn Abi Usaybi'a in his Tabaqdt al-tibbd' from an autograph by the well-known physician Ibn Butldn (d. 458/1066) about the "widespread plagues" that occurred in his own life-time. (August Muller's edition, Cairo 1299 AH, vol. I, pp. 241-43):

'Ibn Butla-n:

Abui 1-Hasan, al-Mukhtdr [...], a Christian from the people of Baghdad, who worked with, and became a student of Abfu l-Faraj 'Abdullah b. al Tayyib [d.435/1043]. He was also attached to (wa Idzama ay1an) Aba I-Hasan Thabit b. Ibrahim b. Zahrfin al-Harranm the physician [d. 365/976].26 Ibn Butlan travelled from Baghdad to Egypt, aiming to meet 'Ali b. Ridwan [d. 453/1061], having left Baghdad in the year 439/[1047-48]. On his way he stopped in Aleppo where he stayed for a while, being welcomed and generously treated by Mu'izz al-Dawlah Th[i]mal ibn Salih.-He then entered al-Fustat in the beginning of Jumada II, [441/[1049] and stayed there for three years during the reign of the Egyptian Caliph al-Mustansir bi-'llah [427/1036 487/1094]. He then travelled from Egypt to al-Qustantiniyya [446/

26) IAU, Tabaq?t, I: 227-30.


130 Al. Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

1054] where he stayed for a year.-In his [life]-time many plagues occurred, and I have copied the following from what he related':

"Amongst the widely known plagues (mashdhir al-awbi'ah) in our time is the one that happened at the appearance of the comet (al-kawkab al-dthdri) in Gemini in the year 446/[1054-55]. In that year, when all the burying places had been filled in al-Qustantiniyya, fourteen thousand bodies were buried in [St.] Luke's Church in the autumn. In the middle of the summer of the year [4]47/[1055 56] the Nile was low, and in al-Fustdt and al-Sham most of the [resident] people and all strangers perished except those whom God saved.-The plague then moved to 'Iraq, devastating its people, and destruction was spread by the con tending foreign soldiers. This state of affairs continued up to the year 454/[1062 63]. People developed black ulcers and swelling spleens. The [customary?] succession of fevers and the routine of sailors were put out of order and [accord inglyl the [medical] science of prognostic judgments was disturbed."

[Ibn Butldan] also said, that "because the comet appeared in the sign of Gemini, which is the ascendant of Egypt, the plague was bound to occur in al-Fustat because of the Nile's failure at the sign's appearance, thereby confirming Ptolemy's warning, 'woe to the people of Egypt

when a comet appears in Gemini and deeply descends in it'. Then, when Saturn descended into the sign of Cancer the destruction was complete in 'Iraq, al-Mawsil and al-Jazira; and disorder prevailed in Diyar Bakr, Rabi'a, Fars, Kirman, Bilad al-Maghrib, Yemen, al-Fustat, and al-Sham. The affairs of the world's rulers fell in disarray, and wars, prices (ghald'), and plagues multiplied, thus proving Ptolemy correct when he said that the world would be shaken when Saturn and Mars are in conjunction in Cancer."

[I have copied] also the following from Ibn Butlan's writing in regard to the great plagues affecting knowledge by obliterating the men of science in his [life]-time. He said:

"[Amongst] those who perished in the span of roughly ten years are: [1] [al Sharif] al-Murtada [d. 436/1044], [2] al-Shaykh Abfi I-Hasan [=Abu l--Husayn] al-BasrI [d. 436/1044], [3] al-FaqIh Abui 1-Hasan al-Quduiri [d. 428/1037], [4] Aqda l-Qudah al-Mawardi [d. 450/1058-59], and [5] Ibn al-Tayyib al-Tabari [?];

and, from among those concerned with the ancient sciences: [6] Aba 'All ibn al-Haytham Wd. in or after 432/1040], [7] Abi Sa'Id al-Yamdmi



[d. ca. 425/1033], [8] Abui 'Ali ibn al-Samh [d. 418/1027-28], [9] Sd'id al-Tabib [? end of the first half of the 5th/llth c.], [10] Abuj 1 Faraj 'Abdullih ibn al-Tayyib [d. 435/ 1043-44];

and, from among those distinguished in the fields of literature and epistle-writing: [11] 'Ali ibn 'Isa al-Rab'i [?], [12] Aba 1-Fath al Nisabfri [?]; [13] Mihyar al-Sha'ir [d. 428/1037]; [14] Abt l-'Al& ibn Nazik [?], [15] Abuf 'Al ibn Mu-salaya [d. 22 Jumada I, 497/1104] ,27 [16] al-Ra'Is Aba I-Hasan al-Sabi' [d. 448/1055], and [17] Aba 1-'Ala' al-Ma'arri [d. 449/1058].

Thus the lamps of knowledge were put out, leaving the surviving minds in darkness."

End of Ibn Abi Usaybi'a's Quote from Ibn Butldn's Autograph

Appendix Kamdl al-Dins Report of How He Came to Write His Commentary! Revision of Ibn al Haythams Kitab al-Manazir. (Translation of the Arabic text in the Hyderabad edition of the Tanqik and MS Istanbul, Ahmet III 3340, dated 716/1316).

"[Before coming to Tabriz] I had been concerned for some time with the science of optics, and I had desired to clarify the way in which sight perceives the visible forms, especially [when this happens] by means of refraction (in'itdl). I had found that visi ble objects in water or behind crystals (al-billawr, al-ballir) take on unusual shapes differing from their appearance [when seen] rectilinearly ('ald istiqdmah) in air which Euclid's Optics failed to explain. Then I read in the writings of more than one of the leading thinkers28 that light radiates from a shining object on straight lines,

27) Y?q?t, Mu jam al-Udaba (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-llmiyya, s.d.), III: 525-530,

under: Ab? Sad (not Abu Ali) al-Aia b. al-Hasan b. Wahb b. al-M?sal?y?, "one of

the well-known secretaries, from the people of al-Karkh," "was a Christian who con

verted to Islam at the time of al-waz?r Ab? Shuja." The entry on Ibn M?sal?ya must

have been added after the death of Ibn Butl?n. 28) That Nas?r al-D?n al-Tus? (d. 672/1274) was one ofthe "leading thinkers" who pro

moted the equality of the angles of incidence, reflection, refraction and so-called

"penetration" is confirmed by a strange argument attributed to him in MS D?nishg?h Kit?bkh?ne Markaz?, No. 2136, pp. 1-6, Tehran: copied in Jumada II, 1124/1712. See also: Sabra, The Optics of Ibn al-Haytham, Bks I-III, vol. II, Introduction, lxiv


132 Al. Sabra / Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133

and when it meets a surface like that of water it is reflected (in'akasa) at angles equal to those made with the [reflecting] surface in incidence (zawdyd al-musddafah), and that [the light] goes through the surface (yanfudhu) along the line ('aid samt) of [the initial] radiation, and it bends into the surface (wa in'atafatfihi) along the line of reflection from it, thus giving rise to four angles, namely the angles of straight [radia tion], reflection, penetration (al-nuffudh), and refraction-all of these being equal to one another, as in this figure." (See the figure on page 1 19.)

I was at a loss to find where these rules came from and, assuming this premise for a while, I found that it leads to rules of vision by refraction all of which are contrary to experience. My puzzlement increased, and I appealed to the authority [al-hadra, politely referring to his teacher, Qutb al-Din al-Shirazi] for help. I related the whole story, also mentioning people's claim that refraction is the reason why the stars appear to be larger near the horizon than in the middle of the sky: how, then, could this

matter be settled, when the inquiries concerning it in astronomical books are not sat isfactory?- He was quick to respond to my request, and considering the matter for a

while he remembered that he had seen (ra'd) in his youth (f/ awdn sibdh) [...], [p. 4] in one of the libraries in Persia, a book attributed to Ibn al-Haytham on optics, in two large volumes, and he said, this might be what you seek, and I shall try to obtain it, even if it were with the Pleiades. And once he actually initiated the search I was quite sure of his success. [...].

Eventually, while I turned from one hope to another, the target was hit and the book arrived from a very far country (wa hasala l-kitib min aqyd l-bildd). He [al Shirdzi] called me and handed me the book. I felt the comfort of the certainty pro duced by what [the book contained of] innumerable pieces of useful information, and subtleties and novelties, all supported by genuine experience and precise experi ments based on geometry and observation instruments, and on reasonings from true premises.- It then became clear that the mentioned [faulty] premise on refraction was only a distorted borrowing [by some] who missed the truth and failed to make the effort to find it.

Having realized the loftiness of the science [of vision] in itself, being a science of the most noble faculty among the soul's external faculties, if not in all then in most respects-given the strength of [the books] discourse and the abundance of its prob lems and fine points that make it worthy of being not only the "eye" but the "pupil" of the eye of the mathematical sciences. [p. 5] Then I applied my abilities to [the book] and devoted myself to resolving it, until I covered most of it under the high directions [of my mentor].

Having grasped what I had sought, and seeing that students (al-tulldb) complain about long discourses, and the text of this book being rather too long, and given my wish to see it circulating among intelligent people, I proposed to my mentor that it

lxxiii, on Kam?l al-D?n al-F?ris?, and esp. note 112; and Elaheh Kheirandish, "The

Puzzle of Tus?'s Optical Works," Les sciences dans le monde iranien, eds. N. Pourjavady et Z. Vesel (Tehran: IFRI, 2004), 197-213.


A.I Sabra /Early Science and Medicine 12 (2007) 117-133 133

be summarized. He ordained: I have desired for some time to comment on Apolloni us's book on Conics, and I have collected for this purpose perhaps more Arabic geo metrical writings than would have been possible for anyone else to gather. Now there is the additional urge to write a Commentary on this book. But I have no time for both of them, being also busy to comment on the Kulliyyit of [Avicenna's] Kitdb al Qanuin ft I- Tibb, which pulls me away from other important matters because it is demanded by distinguished and important people. I will however satisfy you by advising you enough on both of these two [projects]. He then suggested, and I accepted, to do what he considered appropriate for this book [on optics]. -I have summarized [the book] in such a way as not to miss any of the lessons it offers, and I have kept its parts all together without omitting any of them. I have also inserted in the text what might clarify anything problematic, or incomplete, or too long, or, as an objection against something stated by the author."


Article Contentsp. [117]p. 118p. 119p. 120p. 121p. 122p. 123p. 124p. 125p. 126p. 127p. 128p. 129p. 130p. 131p. 132p. 133

Issue Table of ContentsEarly Science and Medicine, Vol. 12, No. 2 (2007), pp. 117-246Front MatterThe "Commentary" That Saved the Text. The Hazardous Journey of Ibn al-Haytham's Arabic "Optics" [pp. 117-133]Semence, vertu formatrice et intellect agent chez Nicol Leoniceno entre la tradition arabo-latine et la renaissance des commentateurs grecs [pp. 134-165]Traduire Linn en franais la fin du XVIIIe sicle [pp. 166-186]Poetry or Pathology? Jesuit Hypochondria in Early Modern Naples [pp. 187-213]Review EssayOut on the Limb: The Place of Medicine in Descartes' Philosophy [pp. 214-222]Honor Thy Newton [pp. 223-229]

Book ReviewsReview: untitled [pp. 230-232]Review: untitled [pp. 233-235]Review: untitled [pp. 236-237]Review: untitled [pp. 238-239]Review: untitled [pp. 240-241]Review: untitled [pp. 242-243]Review: untitled [pp. 244-245]

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The Hazardous Journey of Ibn Al Haytam- A I Sabra