Islamic Civilization

The Islamic empire has had many achievements and innovations that have impacted the world greatly. One of these innovations was the astrolabe. The astrolabe is a very ancient astronomical device that is originally from Greece but was vastly improved and modified by the Islamic empire. It had some short-term impacts on the Islamic empire. They used it to show the direction of mecca, the timings for the prayers and for the calculation of months in the lunar calendar.

While Europe was experiencing the Dark Ages, Islam was experiencing a time of intense philosophical and scientific achievements. The Islamic empire in the eight century preserved and elaborated scientific tradition. They assimilated ancient wisdom and adapted it to their own needs and thinking. Islamic civilization expanded society as a whole and made great contributions in many fields, such as science, math, medicine, theology, and architecture. Without the contributions made by the Islamic culture, the Renaissance Era would not have been the same.

The events at that time went in a way that al-Biruni himself described them as: “After I had barely settled down for a few years, I was permitted by the Lord of Time to go back home, but I was compelled to participate in worldly affairs, which excited the envy of fools, but which made the wise pity me.” [1] Al-Biruni was a great Muslim scientist in his era and his books and theories are still subjects of study in higher level educations, i.e. Masters and PhD. His mathematical and physics theories and findings caused great discoveries to clarify questions about life, stars and in general astronomy. He plays an important role in science, especially astronomy. His scientific explorations and theories made him one of the retest scientists ... ... middle of paper ... ... Waardenburg, 27.

Arabic language had great influence on many languages and Middle English was not an exception. By the 8th century Arabic language drove out Latin as the dominant Language, The Arabic civilization was able to spread and flourish throughout the Spain by the 11th and 12th century. As a matter of fact John the bishop of Seville was translating the Bible into Arabic (Metlitzki 5). These events made some European scholars to show interest in learning Arabic, mostly in the field of mathematics and astronomy. The most notable scholars who were interested in Arabic were Adelard of Bath (c. 1080-c.1150) who have travelled from England to mainland Europe to study Arabic, he had translated the astronomical tables of Al-Khawarizmi into Latin.

Islamic libraries contained a wealth of knowledge which was taken from other civilizations and translated to Arabic such as the House of Wisdom. These libraries had upwards of 2 million books, a massive accomplishment considering they did not have movable type. The Islamic Empire also saw great advances in mathematical understanding with the creation of trigonometry and algebra. The Islamic Empire took great lengths to expand their understanding of the natural world. The Caliph sent scholars to Persia, Rome, and Greece who brought back texts that were translated to Arabic.

Islamic scholars played a critical role in retrieving scholarly works from these civilizations and preserving them for future use. According to to Carl Boyer in his book, also titled A History of Mathematics, “Had it not been for the sudden cultural awakening in Islam during the second half of the eighth century, considerably more of ancient science and mathematics would have been lost” (Boyer 227). Islamic scholars did more than just preserve mathematical history. Persian mathematicians, Abu Ja’far Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi, Abu Bakr al-Karaji, and Omar Khayyam, attached rules and provided logical proofs to Grecian geometry thus creating a new field of mathematics called algeb... ... middle of paper ... ...h is done today. In fact, he is most known as a poet, not a mathematician.

The knowledge of mankind’s use of Mathematics comes from the Babylonians and Egyptians which later adopted and improved by the Greeks. Babylonia was considered one of the ancient civilizations were agricultural advancement originated. Just like Egyptian mathematics, Babylonian mathematics was practiced to address the need of their society. Mathematics was used in irrigation, industrial works such as weaving, metal works, masonry, pottery, and to build homes and temple decorated with mosaics in geometric patterns. It was also used in the proper execution of their tax laws, to measure their lands and even in making dice for their leisure games.

This caused small farmers to eventually completely die out, or hide behi... ... middle of paper ... ...urn led to a rejection of politics and many Roman citizens becoming independent of the government. (Sterns page 109 and 111) As a result, it can be concluded that many factors attributed to the collapse of the Roman Empire. First and foremost, the collapse of the economy caused what was once a beautiful, elaborate empire to fade away. The system of government in place was not capable of controlling the vast territories in its possession. The spread of Christianity resulted in a loss of Roman culture.

Significant societies have perished because of the deceasing of powerful leaders, natural disasters, and rapid expansion. One of the main causes for a society to fail is a powerful leader dying. In Ancient Greece, when Alexander the great died, people fought over the land he owned and conquered the empire. This was then split into three kingdoms, “His generals fought to control the empire.” ( Alexander's empire crumbles 8 ). Also, in Egypt when Ramses the second died the people didn’t know how to run the empire.

Due to the founding of The Republic in 509 B.C., the era of Roman kings came to a end. In this year the Romans supposedly expelled the last Etruscan king. Due to this, the Romans replaced the old monarchy and put a Republic that lasted until 30 B.C. Then Rome became the dominant Western power, it seized territories throughout the Mediterranean, created an efficient and enormous army, and finally started to manage all of the many properties that had been acquired. However this time of peace and bliss for the Empire was non existent, from 460-360 B.C., Rome had constant wars.