European depiction of the Persian physician
Rhazes, in Gerard of Cremona's "Recueil des traités de medecine" 1250-1260. Gerard de Cremona translated numerous works by Arab scholars.
(;
Latin:
Gerardus Cremonensis; c. 1114–1187), was a
Lombard translator of
Arabic scientific works found in the abandoned Arab
libraries of
Toledo,
Spain.
He was one of a small group of
scholars who invigorated
medieval Europe in the twelfth century by transmitting
Greek and Arab traditions in
astronomy,
medicine and other
sciences, in the form of
translations into Latin, which made them available to every literate person in the West. One of his most famous translations is of
Ptolemy's
Almagest from Arabic texts found in Toledo. Gerard has been mistakenly credited as the translator of
Avicenna's
Canon of Medicine (see below).
Life
Gerard was born in
Cremona. Dissatisfied with the meager philosophies of his Italian teachers, Gherardo followed his true passions and went to Toledo. There he learned Arabic, initially so that he could read
Ptolemy's
Almagest, which had a traditional high reputation among scholars, but which, before his departure to Castile, was not yet known in Latin translation. (The first Latin translation was made, from the Greek around 1160 in Sicily). Although we do not have detailed information of the date when Gerard went to
Castile, it was no later than 1144.
Toledo, which had been a provincial capital in the
Caliphate of Cordoba and remained a seat of learning, was safely available to a
Catholic like Gerard, since it had been conquered from the
Moors by
Alfonso VI of Castile in 1085. Toledo remained a multicultural capital, insofar as its rulers protected the large Jewish and Muslim quarters, and kept their trophy city an important centre of
Arab and
Hebrew culture. One of the great scholars associated with Toledo was Rabbi
Abraham ibn Ezra, Gerard's contemporary. The Muslim and Jewish inhabitants of Toledo adopted the
language and many customs of their conquerors, embodying
Mozarabic culture. The city was full of
libraries and
manuscripts, and was one of the few places in medieval Europe where a Christian could be exposed to Arabic language and culture.
In Toledo Gerard devoted the remainder of his life to making Latin translations from the Arabic scientific literature.
Gerard's translations
thumb|Al-Razi's
Recueil des traités de médecine translated by Gerard of Cremona, second half of 13th century.
Gerard of Cremona's Latin translation of the Arabic version of Ptolemy’s
Almagest made c. 1175 was the most widely known in
Western Europe before the Renaissance. Unbeknownst to Gerard, an earlier translation of the
Almagest had already been made in Sicily from the original Greek c. 1160 under the aegis of
Henricus Aristippus, although this version was not as widely used in the Middle Ages as Gerard's version.
George of Trebizond and then
Johannes Regiomontanus retranslated it from the Greek original in the fifteenth century. The
Almagest formed the basis for Western
astronomy until it was eclipsed by the theories of
Copernicus.
Gerard edited for Latin readers the
Tables of Toledo, the most accurate compilation of astronomical data ever seen in Europe at the time. The
Tables were partly the work of
Al-Zarqali, known to the West as
Arzachel, a mathematician and astronomer who flourished in
Cordoba in the eleventh century.
Al-Farabi, the Islamic "second teacher" after
Aristotle, wrote hundreds of treatises. His book on the sciences,
Kitab al-lhsa al Ulum, discussed classification and fundamental principles of science in a unique and useful manner. Gerard rendered it as
De scientiis (
On the Sciences).
Gerard translated
Euclid’s
Geometry and
Alfraganus's
Elements of Astronomy.
Gerard also composed original treatises on
algebra,
arithmetic and
astrology. In the astrology text, longitudes are reckoned both from Cremona and Toledo.
In total, Gerard of Cremona
translated 87 books from the Arabic language,
including such originally Greek works as
Ptolemy's
Almagest,
Archimedes'
On the Measurement of the Circle,
Aristotle's
On the Heavens, and
Euclid's
Elements of Geometry; such originally Arabic works as
al-Khwarizmi's
On Algebra and Almucabala,
Jabir ibn Aflah's
Elementa astronomica,
[V. J. Katz, A History of Mathematics: An Introduction, p. 291.]and works by
al-Razi (Rhazes),
[Jerome B. Bieber. , Santa Fe Community College.]A second Gerard Cremonensis
Some of the works credited to Gerard of Cremona are probably the work of a second Gerard Cremonensis, more precisely
Gerard de Sabloneta (
Sabbioneta) (thirteenth century). His best work translated Greek/Arabic medical texts, rather than astronomical ones, but the two translators have understandably been confused with one another. His translations from works of
Avicenna are said to have been made by order of the emperor
Frederick II.
Other treatises attributed to the "Second Gerard" include the
Theoria or
Theorica planetarum, and versions of
Avicenna’s
Canon of Medicine— the basis of the numerous subsequent Latin editions of that well-known work — and of the
Almansor of
al-Razi ("Rhazes" in Latin-speaking Europe). The attribution of the
Theorica to Gerard of Sabbionetta is not well supported by manuscript evidence and should not be regarded as certain.
See also
