y that it was due to the influence of Mohammedanism that learning spread through Persia and Arabia; and so it was, in part. But l

d learning, inviting to his court scholars from Greece, and encouraging the introduction of culture from the West as well as from the East. At this time Aristotle and Plato were translated, and portions of the Hito-padē?a, or Fables of Pil

ere translated into Arabic by Al-Fazārī.[366] Al-Khowārazmī and ?abash (A?med ibn 'Abdallāh, died c. 870) based their well-known tables upon the work of Al-Fāzarī. It may be asserted as highly probable that the numerals came at the same time as

ans Al-Ma?'ūdī and Al-Bīrūnī follow quite closely upon the men mentioned, it is well to note again the Arab writers on Hin

e same period or earlier (since they are mentioned in the Fihrist,[369] 987 A.D.), who explicitly use the word "Hindu" or "Indian," are Sinān ibn al-Fat?[370] of ?arrān, and Ahmed ibn 'Omar, al-Karābīsī.[371] In the eleventh century come Al-Bīrūnī[372] (973-1048) and 'Ali ibn A?med, Abū 'l-?asan, Al-Nasawī[373

thmetic.[378] There were numerous other Arabic writers upon arithmetic, as that subject occupied one of the high places among the sciences, bu

side the ?obār. The title of the work is Interesting and Beautiful Problems on Numbers copied by A?med ibn Mo?ammed ibn 'Abdaljalīl, Abū Sa'īd, al-

rent types of strong races blend,-a great renaissance in divers lines. It was seen in the blending of such types at Miletus in the time of Thales, at Rome in the days of the early invaders, at Alexandria when the Greek set firm foot on Egyptian soil, and we see it now whe

ancient civilization. "If they did not possess the spirit of invention which distinguished the Greeks and the Hindus, if they did not show the perseverance in their observations that characterized the Chinese astronomers, they at leas

Asia, in Northern Africa, and in a goodly portion of Spain. The Arab empire was an ellipse of learning with its foci at Bagdad and Cord

conquered Khorassan and Afghanistan, so that the learning and the commercial customs of India at once found easy access to the newly-established schools and the bazaars of Mesopotamia and western Asia. The particular paths of conquest and of commerce were either by way of the Khyber Pass and through Kabul, Herat and Khorassan, or by sea through the strait of Ormuz to Basra (Busra) at the head of the Persian Gulf, and thence to Bagdad. As a matter of fact, one form of Arabic numerals, the one now in use by the Arabs, is attributed to

ed continually from the very corners of the orbis terrarum the many-tongued generation, just rising, or just risen into manhood, in order to gain wisdom." For here it was that Al-Man?ūr and Al-Māmūn and Hārūn al-Rashīd (Aaron the Just) made for a time the world's center of intellectual activity in general and in the domain of mathematics in particular.[389] It was just after the Sindhind was brought to Bagdad that Mo?ammed ibn Mūsā al-Khowārazmī, whose name has already been mentioned,[390] was called to that city. He was the most celebrated mathematician of his time, either in the East or West, writing

rote a work on Hindu arithmetic,[394] so that the subject must have been attracting considerable attention at that time. Indeed, the struggle to have the Hindu numerals replace the Arabic did not cease for a

e other the one used by Al-Khowārazmī. The question then remains, how did this second