Taqi al-Din Muhammad ibn Ma'ruf

Work in the observatorium of Taqi al-Din

Taqi al-Din Muhammad ibn Ma'ruf al-Shami al-Asadi (Arabic: تقي الدين محمد بن معروف الشامي, Modern Turkish: Takiyuddin or Taki) (1526–1585) was an Ottoman Turkish^[1][2] Muslim polymath: He was the author of more than ninety books on a wide variety of subjects, including astronomy, clocks, engineering, mathematics, mechanics, optics and natural philosophy. ^{[citation needed]} In 1574 the Ottoman Sultan Murād III invited Taqī al-Dīn to build an observatory in Istanbul. Using his exceptional knowledge in the mechanical arts, Taqī al-Dīn constructed instruments like huge armillary and mechanical clocks that he used in his observations of the comet of 1577. He also used European celestial and terrestrial globes that were delivered to Istanbul in gift-exchange. The major work that resulted his work in the observatory is titled The tree of ultimate knowledge [in the end of time or the world] in the Kingdom of the Revolving Spheres: The astronomical tables of the King of Kings [Murād III](Sidrat al-muntah al-afkar fi malkūt al-falak al-dawār– al-zij al-Shāhinshāhi). The work was prepared according to the results of the observations carried out in Egypt and Istanbul in order to correct and complete Ulugh Beg’s Zij al-Sultani. The first 40 pages of the work deal with calculations, followed by discussions of astronomical clocks, heavenly circles, and information about three eclipses which he observed at Cairo and Istanbul. For corroborating data of other observations of eclipses in other locale like Daud al-Riyyadi (David the Mathematician), David Ben-Shushan of Salonika. According to the Hapsburg ambassador, Salomon Schweigger a charlatan who deceived Sultan Murad III and had him spent enormous resources.^[3]

Taqi al-Din's method of finding coordinates of stars was reportedly more precise than those of his contemporaries, Tycho Brahe and Nicolas Copernicus. Brahe is thought to have been aware of Taqi al-Din's work.^[2]

See also

• Islamic science
• Islamic astronomy
• Istanbul observatory of Taqi al-Din
• Inventions in the Muslim world

Notes

1. ↑ " Chief Astronomer Taqi al-Din was born to a family of Turkish descent in Damascus." Hoffmann, Dieter; İhsanoğlu, Ekmeleddin; Djebbar, Ahmed; Günergun, Feza. Science, technology, and industry in the Ottoman world in Volume 6 of Proceedings of the XXth International Congress of History of Science p. 19. Publisher Brepols, 2000. ISBN 2-503-51095-7
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Ágoston, Gábor; Masters, Bruce Alan. Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire Infobase Publishing, 2009. p. 552 ISBN 0-8160-6259-5
3. ↑ Avner Ben-Zaken, "The Revolving Planets and the Revolving Clocks: Circulating Mechanical Objects in the Mediterranean", History of Science, xlix 2010. pp. 125-148.

Further reading

• Ben-Zaken, Avner. "The Revolving Planets and the Revolving Clocks: Circulating Mechanical Objects in the Mediterranean", History of Science, xlix (2010), pp. 125-148.
• Ben-Zaken, Avner. Cross-Cultural Scientific Exchanges in the Eastern Mediterranean 1560-1660 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), pp. 8-47.
• King, David A. "Taki al-Din". Encyclopaedia of Islam (2nd Ed.) 10: pp. 132–3. 
• King, David A. (1986). A Survey of the Scientific manuscripts in the Egyptian National Library 5. Winona Lake, IN, USA: American Research Center in Egypt. pp. 171–2. 
• Hassan, Ahmad Y (1976). Taqi al-Din and Arabic Mechanical Engineering. Institute for the History of Arabic Science, Aleppo University. 
• Gautier, Antoine (December 2005). "L'âge d'or de l'astronomie ottomane". L'Astronomie 119. 

• Tekeli, Sevim. (2002). 16’ıncı yüzyılda Osmanlılarda saat ve Takiyüddin’in “mekanik saat konstrüksüyonuna dair en parlak yıldızlar = The clocks in Ottoman Empire in 16th century and Taqi al Din’s the brightest stars for the construction of the mechanical clocks. Second edition, Ankara: T. C. Kültür Bakanlıgi.
• Unat, Yavuz, “Time in The Sky of Istanbul, Taqî al Dîn al-Râsid’s Observatory”, Art and Culture Magazine, Time in Art, Winter 2004/Issue 11, pp. 86–103.

External links

• Fazlıoğlu, İhsan (2007). "Taqī al‐Dīn Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Zayn al‐Dīn Maʿrūf al‐Dimashqī al‐Ḥanafī". In Thomas Hockey et al. The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. New York: Springer. pp. 1122–3. ISBN 978-0-387-31022-0.  (PDF version)