Light from the East by John Freely
Author:John Freely [Freely, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780857731012
Publisher: I.B.Tauris
CHAPTER 11
Islamic Technology
Much of the Islamic legacy in science is preserved in manuscript collections around the world, particularly in countries that were and continue to be centres of Muslim culture, though many manuscripts are also found in Europe as well as the United States and India. Among the manuscripts that are preserved in these libraries are a number of works on technology, part of the Islamic legacy that has been to some extent overlooked by historians, though it transformed society not only in the medieval Muslim world but in the Christian West as well.
The most authoritative modern work on this subject is Islamic Technology, An Illustrated History, by Ahmad Y. al-Hassan and Donald R. Hill. The authors note that ‘historians have acknowledged the progress achieved by Muslim scientists in mathematics, astronomy and the exact sciences, but they have for the most part been harsh in their judgment on Islamic technology’. They go on to point out the important role that technology played in Islamic civilisation, particularly during the golden age in Baghdad and al-Andalus. ‘When people speak of the splendour of Granada or Baghdad, they are referring in fact not only to their artistic grandeur, but also to the high level of their technology.’
The cover of their book has a miniature from al-Jazari’s Book on the Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices, one of the manuscripts that I viewed in the library that is housed in a former madrasa of the Süleymaniye mosque in Istanbul. The miniature is an intricate drawing in coloured inks showing a water-raising device known as a saqiya, an animal-powered machine that originated in the Roman era and was used for irrigation throughout the medieval Islamic world. Al-Hassan and Hill describe the operation of the saqiya in detail and point out that ‘It is still in limited use today in the Muslim world and in the Iberian peninsula and the Balearic islands.’ And indeed in the early 1960s I saw animal-powered saqiyas in use in both Turkey and Egypt, though the devices are probably now powered by gasoline engines.
Their book has chapters on mechanical engineering; civil engineering; military technology; ships and navigation; chemical technology; textiles, paper and leather; agriculture and food technology; mining and metallurgy; engineers and artisans; with discussions of the historical issues in the introduction and epilogue, including a section on the transfer of technology from the Islamic world to the West. The latter section cites examples of Arabic words that entered English and other European languages through the introduction of Islamic technology.
To cite but a few examples: in textiles – muslin, sarsanet, damask, taffeta, tabby; in naval matters – arsenal, admiral; in chemical technology – alembic, alcohol, alkali; in paper – ream; in foodstuffs – alfalfa, sugar, syrup, sherbet; in dyestuffs – saffrons, kermes; in leather working – Cordovan and Morocco. As one would expect, Spanish is particularly rich in words of Arabic origin. We have, for example, tabona for a mill, acena for a mill or water-wheel, acequia for an irrigation canal.
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