ब्राह्मस्फुटसिद्धान्त (ब्रह्मगुप्त - शून्य, कुट्टक, बीजगणित एवं सम्पूर्ण २१ अध्याय सान्वय सटीक)

12 ASTRONOMY IN ANCIENT NATIONS
faithful had to turn during prayers, also the importance of the
lunar motions for the calendar, and the respect in which judicial
astrology was held all over the East. The Caliph Al Mamun,
son of Harun Al Rashid (813-833) is the first great patron of
science, although the Omayyad Caliphs had much earlier an
observatory near Damascus, and the Jew Mashallah (who died
about 815) had already before the reign of Al Mamun won a
name as an observer and astrologer. But the Damascus observa-
tory became quite eclipsed by that erected at Baghdad in 829
where continuous observations were made and tables of the pla-
netary motions constructed while an important attempt was made
to determine the size of the Earth. Among the astronomers of
Al Mamun and his successors one of the greatest was Ahmed ben
Muhammed Al Fargani (afterwards known in the West as Alfra-
ganus), whose Elements of Astronomy were translated into Latin
in the twelfth century and contributed greatly to the revival of
science in Europe.¹ Tabit ben Korra (826-901) was a most
prolific writer and translator, but is chiefly known in the history
of astronomy as a supporter of the erroneous idea of the oscilla-
tory motion of the equinoxes. A younger contemporary of his,
Muhammed Al Battani (died 929), was the most renowned of all
the Arabian astronomers and became known in the West in the
twelfth century (under the name of Albategnius) by the trans-
lation of the introduction to his tables.² Already in his time
the power of the Caliphs had commenced to decline, and they
soon lost all temporal power. The study of astronomy was,
however, not influenced by this loss of patronage, as the Persian
family of the Buyids, who in 946 obtained possession of the post
of Amir-al-Omara (corresponding to the Frankish Major Domus)
took over the role of patrons of science, so long and so
honourably carried on by the Abbasid Caliphs. Sharaf al Daula
built in 988 a new observatory in the garden of his palace, and
among the astronomers who worked there was Muhammed Abu 'l
Wefa al Buzjani (959-998), who wrote an Almagest in order to

1. First printed at Ferrara in 1493. See the edition of Golius, Amsterdam,
3. Translated by Plato of Tivoli. First Printed in 1537 after the book of
   Alfargani. Dreyer has used the edition of Bologna, 1645, and a new edition
   which is now being published by C. A. Nallino, of which the Arabic and a
   Latin translation of the text have already appeared (Pubbl. d. R. Osserva-
   torio di Brera in Milano, No. 40, 1899-1903).