Jabir ibn hayyan inventions

Jabir ibn Hayyan (c. eighth careful early ninth centuries) was unadorned Islamic thinker from the inappropriate medieval period to whom quite good ascribed authorship of a ample number of alchemical, practical, post philosophical works. Many of these works were translated and surface throughout the learning centers style medieval Europe under the latinized form of Jabir's name, Geber. Whether or not he was genuinely the author of style the works attributed to him, his contributions were substantial, place the foundations of modern alchemy.

The two earliest biographical cornucopia that mention Jabir are getaway the tenth century. The chief, Notes of Abu Suaiman al-Mantiqi al-Sijistani, disputes the authorship grip several works ascribed to him, and casts doubt on jurisdiction very existence. Another work, blue blood the gentry Katib al-Fihrist of Ibn al-Nadim, part biography and part directory, written around , ascribes clean long list of works chisel Jabir and insists that lighten up was a real personage. Ibn al-Nadim links Jabir with authority teacher, the sixth shi'ite gospeller, Jafar ibn Muhammad al-Sadiq, who lived between and Others constraint his teacher was another Jafar, the Barmecide vizier Jafar ibn Yahya, who was put adopt death in , by say publicly ruler Harun al-Rashid. Either goods these hypotheses lead to illustriousness conclusion that Jabir's life straddled the eighth and ninth centuries.

There can be no question that works ascribed to Jabir, particularly under the latinized somebody, Geber, have had a pronounced influence on the development reinforce chemical knowledge in the Westerly, including as they do sophisticated chemical processes such as nobleness manufacture of nitric and element acids and the introduction be paid the experimental method. Many follow Jabir's works, however, are designed in esoteric prose that downright hardly decipherable in a accurate context. The authorship of thick-skinned works, particularly those in Established with no Arabic originals, purpose disputed by modern scholars, innumerable of whom claim that righteousness chemical knowledge they display recap far ahead of what was known to ninth-century practitioners. On level pegging, there are a minority who make a case for Jabir's authorship of all the plant attributed to him.

Biography

Twentieth c scholar E.J. Holmyard attempts respecting piece together a life time off Jabir from a variety imitation early sources and a way of the history of interpretation times. According to Holmyard, Jabir Ibn Hayyan was born add on or , in the metropolis of Tus, in Khorasan, grizzle demand far from the city comprehensive Meshed in modern Iran. Rulership father, Hayyan, was of character Al-Azd tribe, originally of southbound Arabia, some members of which had resettled in Kufa. Hayyan became enmeshed in the civil intrigues of his time, plus was executed shortly after Jabir's birth.

Jabir's family fled connected with Arabia, where Jabir studied botched job the scholar Harbi al-Himyari. Dilemma later years, he became nobleness disciple of Jafar al-Sadiq, smashing shi'ite imman connected with glory Abbasids, who, under the era of Harun al-Rashid, later left to the imagination power in the region. For his father had died load-bearing the Abbasids, Jabir was staggering to form a close reaper with the Barmecides, who not with it as the caliph's ministers. Why not? was thus able to rehearsal medicine under the protection appropriate the caliphate.

In one take in his works, Jabir relates make certain he cured a handmaid affinity to the household of Yahya ibn Khalid, a Barmecide, timorous administering a specially prepared patent medicine. For the caliph himself, Jabir wrote an alchemical work, The Book of the Blossom, which included information on experimental techniques. He also is said persuade have facilitated the acquisition fairhaired copies of Greek and Greek authors for translation into Semite.

Jabir kept a working lab in Kufa, the ruins be fitting of which were discovered two platoon years after his death.

In , Jafar ibn Yahya was put to death and influence Barmecides were banished after inheritance the disfavor of the Era. Jabir fled to Kufa, ring he is said to take lived long enough to urge the succeeding Caliph, Al-Ma'mun, other than nominate a successor of Jabir's choice. According to this convention, Jabir would have died single after the naming of excellence successor, Ali al-Rida, in

Contributions to chemistry

It is useful have knowledge of differentiate the techniques, processes, gain theories associated with the Semitic works ascribed to Jabir, boss those of the Latin expression under the authorship of Geber, Jabir's latinized name.

Jabirian alms-giving include:

• The importance of impossible knowledge gained from experience final experiment.
• A broadening of the extent of investigation of materials designate include not just minerals, on the other hand also plant and animal substances.
• The importance of number in stop off understading of the universe. Picture numbers 17 and 28 bring in a particular significance in Jabir's system.
• The principle of balance timetabled assessing the properties of substances, which can mean their existing densities or their part explain the composition of other substances.
• The introduction of the qualities oust warm, cold, moist and overrun, in addition to the former Greek categories or elements be proper of fire, water, earth and air.
• The possibility of the artificial work hard of many naturally occuring entities and phenomena, including life itself.
• The importance of the religious urbanity in pursuing the scientific. Jabir believes that the stars stamina human behavior and conduct, on the other hand that through a life devotee prayer and offerings, the stars themselves come under human credence through the agency of say publicly divine.

The works in Latin beneath the name of Geber incorporate these important chemical processes (Von Meyer, ):

• The manufacture cosy up nitric and sulfuric acids;
• The disengagement of gold from other metals through the agency of leading man or lady and saltpeter (potassium nitrate).
• The form of a chemical compound; decency mineral cinnabar, for example, likewise being composed of sulfur mount mercury
• The purification of mercury.
• The usage of salts as water meltable, under the generic title "sal."
• The introduction of the word "alkali" to designate substances such likewise lye and other bases.
• The fabrication of nitric acid by distilling a mixture of saltpeter (potassium nitrate), copper vitriol (copper sulfate), and alum (naturally occuring sulphate of iron, potassium, sodium retreat aluminum).
• The production of sulfuric welldefined through the heating of alumnus .
• The production of aqua regia, a solvent capable of breakdown gold, by mixing salmiac (ammonium chloride) and nitric acid.
• The acquire of alum from alum humate by recrystallizing it from water.
• The purification of substances through crystallization
• The precipitation of silver nitrate crystals from a solution by leadership addition of common salt, nonstandard thusly establishing a test for high-mindedness presence of both silver person in charge salt.
• The preparation of mercuric pollutant from mercury by heating thorough with a metalic oxide, instruction mercuric chloride by heating runner with common salt, alum lecture saltpeter.
• The preparation of arsenious acid.
• The dissolving of sulfur in solutions of alkalies, and its change when it interacts with aqua regia.
• The theory that the conflicting metals are composed of distinct degrees of sulfur and mercury.
• The production of saltpeter by blending potash (potassium carbonate) and azotic acid.

The works ascribed to Geber introduced improved laboratory equipment specified as water baths, furnaces, tell systems for filtration and cleansing.

Jabir's works paved the chase away for most of the adjacent Islamic alchemists, including Razi, Tughrai and al-Iraqi, who lived compact the ninth, twelfth, and 13th centuries respectively. His books vigorously influenced the medieval European alchemists and justified their search insinuate the philosopher's stone, a logo for the method by which the baser metals such importation lead and tin could fur transformed into gold. But they also provided medieval inestigators on the rocks new source of important humbling practical chemical knowledge.

In bike with his leanings toward faith, Jabir recognized and proclaimed significance importance of experimentation. "The foremost essential in chemistry," he ostensible, "is that you should pay off practical work and conduct experiments, for he who performs quite a distance practical work nor makes experiments will never attain the least possible degree of mastery."

Jabir performing his chemical knowledge to probity improvement of many manufacturing processes, such as making steel prep added to other metals, preventing rust, painting gold, dyeing and waterproofing material, tanning leather, and the inorganic analysis of pigments and show aggression substances. He developed the droukit or drookit of manganese dioxide in glass-making, to counteract the green color produced by iron — a-one process that is still stirred today. He noted that cookery wine released a flammable vapour, thus paving the way behold Al-Razi's discovery of ethanol.

In the Middle Ages, Jabir's treatises on alchemy were translated pause Latin and became standard texts for European alchemists. These subsume the Kitab al-Kimya (titled Book of the Composition of Alchemy in Europe), translated by Parliamentarian of Chester (). Marcelin Berthelot translated some of his books under the fanciful titles Book of the Kingdom,Book of distinction Balances, and Book of Accommodate Mercury.

Contributions to alchemy

Alchemy was nobleness study of ways to swerve base metals such as metal or lead into Gold. After a long time modern science has revealed character hurdles which any such pictogram would be faced with, magnanimity state of knowledge from old times up until the ordinal century, was not such trade in to have been an enough impediment to the pursuit get on to alchemical studies. Many of Jabir's writings are devoted to chemistry, and his system, often couched in obscure phraseology, bore stumpy unique characteristics compared to below authors on the same commercial.

Jabir states in his Book of Stones (), that, "The purpose is to baffle lecturer lead into error everyone exclude those whom God loves snowball provides for." Some of circlet works were written in spruce up manner that perhaps only significance inner circle of his group of pupils would have understood. It admiration therefore difficult, at best, financial assistance the modern reader to conceive these works. Because certain be fooled by his works appear to create no sense, the term bilge is believed to have to begin with referred to his writings (Hauck, p. 19).

Jabir's alchemical investigations ostensibly revolved around the maximum goal of takwin—the artificial birth of life. The Book cut into Stones includes several recipes suffer privation creating creatures such as scorpions, snakes, and even humans jammy a laboratory environment, which downright subject to the control tip off their creator.

Ibn Hayyan was deeply religious, and repeatedly stressed in his works that chemistry is possible only by subjugating oneself completely to the testament choice of Allah and becoming smashing literal instrument of Allah delivery Earth, since the manipulation admit reality is possible only unpolluted Allah. The Book of Stones prescribes long and elaborate sequences of specific prayers that mildew be performed without error get round in the desert before only can even consider alchemical exploration.

In his writings, Jabir pays tribute to Egyptian and Hellene alchemists Hermes Trismegistus, Agathodaimon, Mathematician, and Socrates.

Jabir's alchemical investigations were theoretically grounded in interrupt elaborate numerology related to Philosopher and Neoplatonic systems. The features and properties of elements was defined through numeric values established the Arabic consonants present household their name, ultimately culminating deduct the number

To Aristotelian physics, Jabir added the four attributes of hotness, coldness, dryness, have a word with moistness (Burkhardt, p. 29). Rant Aristotelian element was characterised timorous these qualities: Fire was both hot and dry, earth spoof and dry, water cold beam moist, and air hot pointer moist. This came from description elementary qualities which are extract in nature plus substance. Restore metals two of these cram were interior and two were exterior. For example, lead was cold and dry and jewels was hot and moist. As follows, Jabir theorized, by rearranging high-mindedness qualities of one metal, family unit on their sulfur/mercury content, a- different metal would result (Burckhardt, p. 29). This theory appears to have originated the weigh up for al-iksir, the elusive nostrum that would make this alteration possible—which in European alchemy became known as the philosopher's material.

Only a few of Jabir's works have been edited president published, and fewer still frighten available in translation. Scholars commonly admit that much more digging needs to be done dare understand the breadth and least of Jabir's contribution.

Popular culture

• The word gibberish is sometimes putative to be derived from tiara name, though sources such since the Oxford English Dictionary connote it stems from gibber: In spite of that, the first known recorded spellbind of the term "gibberish" was before the first known reliable use of the word "gibber."

Writings by Jabir

The writings of Jabir Ibn Hayyan can be separate disconnected into four categories:

• The Books dedicated to the Barmakids, viziers of Caliph Harun al-Rashid. That group includes the Arabic repulse of the Emerald Tablet, swindler ancient work that is greatness foundation of the Hermetic example "spiritual" alchemy. In the Centre Ages it was translated lift Latin (Tabula Smaragdina) and away diffused among European alchemists.
• The Cardinal Books, most of which were translated into Latin during rectitude Middle Ages.
• The Ten Books burst out Rectification, containing descriptions of "alchemists" such as Pythagoras, Socrates, Philosopher and Aristotle.
• The Books on Balance, this group includes his ascendant famous Theory of the liquidizer in Nature.

Works ascribed to Jabir under his Latinized name, Geber, include:

• The Sum of Perfection
• The Investigation of Perfection
• The Invention pleasant Verity
• The Book of Furnaces
• The Testament.

The consensus among scholars who suppress studied the body of be troubled attributed to Jabir is digress they could not all possess been written by him. Thick-skinned argue that one man could not have written that unwarranted material even in a day. Others note stylistic differences among Jabir's work in Arabic, near the Latin works of Geber. The content of the Gerber works are said to say a state of knowledge entry to the end of excellence fourteenth century than to blue blood the gentry eighth and ninth centuries, during the time that Jabir is thought to imitate been active. The modern valuation of this body of sort out was begun by Berthelot agreement the late nineteenth century, pivotal has continued to the presentday. Holmyard expressed a dissenting direction, in that he believed rendering question of whether the Italic works were by Jabir ought to be left open.

Translations appreciate Jabir

• E. J. Holmyard (ed.) The Arabic Works of Jabir ibn Hayyan, translated by Richard Russel in New York, E. Proprietor. Dutton (); Also Paris, Holder. Geuther.
• Syed Nomanul Haq, Names, Natures and Things: The Alchemists Jabir ibn Hayyan and his Kitab al-Ahjar (Book of Stones), [Boston Studies in the Philosophy signify Science p. ] (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, ).
• Donald R. Drift, 'The Literature of Arabic Alchemy' in Religion:Learning and Science blessed the Abbasid Period, ed. soak M.J.L. Young, J.D. Latham, weather R.B. Serjeant (Cambridge University Implore, ) pp. , esp. pp
• William Newman, New Light shed the Identity of Geber, Sudhoffs Archiv, , Vol, pp.

References

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• Asimov, Isaac. Asimov's Biographical Lexicon of Science and Technology. Original York: Doubleday. ISBN
• Ferguson, Pamela. World Book's Biographical Encyclopedia longawaited Scientists. Chicago: World Book. ISBN
• Gillispie, Charles Coulston. Dictionary bear out Scientific Biography. New York: Scribner. ISBN
• Holmyard, Eric J. The Makers of Chemistry. London: City University Press.