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Zakariyya' al-Qazwini (full name: Abū Yaḥyā Zakariyyāʾ ibn Muḥammad ibn Maḥmūd al-Qazwīnī, Arabic: أبو يحيى زكرياء بن محمد بن محمود القزويني), also known as Qazvini (Persian: قزوینی), born c. 1203 in Qazvin (Iran) and died 1283, was a Persian cosmographer and geographer of Arab ancestry.[1]

He belonged to a family of jurists originally descended from Anas bin Malik (a companion of the Islamic prophet Muhammad) which had been well established in Qazvin long before al-Qazwini was born.[2]

His most famous work is the ʿAjāʾib al-makhlūqāt wa-gharāʾib al-mawjūdāt (lit. 'Wonders of the Creation and Unique [phenomena] of the Existence'), a seminal work in cosmography.[3] He is also the author of the geographical dictionary Āthār al-bilād wa-akhbār al-ʿibād (lit. 'Monuments of the Lands and Historical Traditions about Their Peoples').[4]

Career

Born in Qazvin, Iran, al-Qazwini served as a legal expert and judge in several localities in Iran. He traveled around in Mesopotamia and the Levant, and finally entered the circle patronized by the Ilkhanid governor of Baghdad, Ata-Malik Juvayni (d. 1283 CE).[5]

It was to the latter that al-Qazwini dedicated his famous cosmography titled ʿAjāʾib al-makhlūqāt wa-gharāʾib al-mawjūdāt (lit. 'Wonders of the Creation and Unique [phenomena] of the Existence').[6] This treatise, frequently illustrated, was immensely popular and is preserved today in many copies. It was translated into his native Persian language, and later also into Turkish.[7] Al-Qazwini was also well known for his geographical dictionary Āthār al-bilād wa-akhbār al-ʿibād (lit. 'Monuments of the Lands and Historical Traditions about Their Peoples').[8] Both of these treatises reflect extensive reading and learning in a wide range of disciplines.[9]

See also

• List of Persian scientists and scholars
• List of pre-modern Arab scientists and scholars

References

Bibliography

Encyclopedic sources

• Bosworth, C. E. (1987–2011). "Āṯār al-Belād". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica.
• Bosworth, C. E.; Afshar, I. (1984–2011). "ʿAjāʾeb al-Maḵlūqāt". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica.
• Lewicki, T. (1960–2007). "al-Ḳazwīnī". In Bearman, P.; Bianquis, Th.; Bosworth, C.E.; van Donzel, E.; Heinrichs, W.P. (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. doi:10.1163/1573-3912_islam_SIM_4093.
• Maqbul Ahmad, S. (1981). "al-Qazwīnī, Zakariyā ibn Muḥammad ibn Maḥmūd, Abū Yaḥyā". In Gillispie, Charles Coulston (ed.). Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Vol. 11. New York: Charles Scribners’s Sons. pp. 230–233.
• Richter-Bernburg, Lutz (1998). "al-Qazwīnī, Zakariyyā' ibn Muḥammad (c.600–82/c.1203–83)". In Meisami, Julie Scott; Starkey, Paul (eds.). Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature. Vol. 2. London: Routledge. pp. 637–638. ISBN 0-415-06808-8.
• Streck, M. (1913–1936). "al-Ḳazwīnī". In Houtsma, M. Th.; Arnold, T. W.; Basset, R.; Hartmann, R. (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam, First Edition (1913-1936). doi:10.1163/2214-871X_ei1_SIM_4034.

Secondary literature

• Berlekamp, Persis (2011). Wonder, Image, and Cosmos in Medieval Islam. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-030017060-3.
• Black, Jeremy (2014). The Power of Knowledge: How Information and Technology Made the Modern World. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-19854-6.

Editions of the Arabic text

• Wüstenfeld, Ferdinand, ed. (1848). Zakarija Ben Mohammad Ben Mahmud el-Cazwini's Kosmographie. Zweiter Teil. كتاب آثار البلاد Die Denkmäler der Länder. Göttingen: Dieterich. OCLC 1045333568. (edition of the Āthār al-bilād)
• Wüstenfeld, Ferdinand, ed. (1849). Zakarija Ben Muhammed Ben Mahmud el-Cazwini's Kosmographie. Erster Theil. كتاب عجايب المخلوقات Die Wunder der Schöpfung. Göttingen: Dieterich. (edition of the ʿAjāʾib al-makhlūqāt wa-gharāʾib al-mawjūdāt)

Translations

• Ethé, Hermann (1868). Zakarija Ben Muhammed Ben Mahmûd El-Kazwîni's Kosmographie. Nach der Wüstenfeldschen Textausgabe, mit Benutzung und Beifügung der reichhaltigen Anmerkungen und Verbesserungen des Herrn Prof. Dr. Fleischer in Leipzig, aus dem Arabischen zum ersten Male vollständig übersetzt. Leipzig: Fues’s Verlag (R. Reisland). (German translation of the ʿAjāʾib al-makhlūqāt wa-gharāʾib al-mawjūdāt)
• Giese, Alma (1986). Die Wunder des Himmels und der Erde. Bibliothek arabischer Klassiker. Vol. 11. Stuttgart and Vienna: Thienemann, Edition Erdmann. ISBN 9783522621106. OCLC 230831113. (partial German translation of the ʿAjāʾib al-makhlūqāt wa-gharāʾib al-mawjūdāt)

External links

• Islamic Medical Manuscripts at the National Library of Medicine. U.S. National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, MD.
• Kitāb al-ʻajāʾib wa al-gharāʼib. Full online version from the Getty Library.

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