The
fame of the Islamic-Iranian scholar is not only spread in Iran but throughput
the world, currently as a millennium has passed since his death anniversary
many physicians throughout the world refer to his books.
His
full name was Hussain ibn Abdullah ibn Hassan ibn Ali ibn Sina. He was born
around 980 in Afshana, near Bukhara, which was his mother's hometown, in
Greater Khorasan, to a Persian family.
He
studied medicine under a physician named Koushyar. He wrote almost 450
treatises on a wide range of subjects, of which around 240 have survived. In
particular, 150 of his surviving treatises concentrate on philosophy and 40 of
them concentrate on medicine. His most famous works are The Book of Healing, a
vast philosophical and scientific encyclopedia, and The Canon of Medicine,
which was a standard medical text at many medieval universities. The Canon of
Medicine was used as a text-book in the universities of Montpellier and Louvain
as late as 1650.
Moreover
Avicenna developed a medical system that combined his own personal experience
with that of Islamic medicine, the medical system of the Greek physician Galen,
Aristotelian metaphysics, and ancient Persian, Mesopotamian and Indian
medicine.
He
was also the founder of Avicennian logic and the philosophical school of
Avicennism, which were influential among both Muslim and Scholastic thinkers.
He
is also considered the father of the fundamental concept of momentum in
physics, and regarded as a pioneer of aromatherapy for his invention of steam
distillation and extraction of essential oils.
He
also developed the concept of uniformitarianism and law of superposition in
geology, for which he is considered to be the 'father of geology'.
As
Arabic was the common scientific language in his era, most of his and the other
Iranian scholars were penned in Arabic.
List
of some works:
• Kitab al-Shifa’ (The Book of Healing). His major encyclopedia
on philosophy. The book is compiled in four chapters; logic, physics,
mathematics and metaphysics.
•
Al- nejat (Liberatio); the abstract of healing and his philosophical theories.
•
Al-Qanun fi’l-tibb (The Canon of Medicine) Encyclopedia of medicine.
•
Danishnama-i ‘ala’i (The Book of Scientific Knowledge) Metaphysics of Avicenna.
•
Al-Isharat wa-‘l-tanbihat (Remarks and Admonitions)
The
Canon of Medicine is a 14-volume medical encyclopedia written Avicenna. The
book was based on a combination of his own personal experience, medieval
Islamic medicine, the writings of the Roman physician Galen, the Indian
physicians Sushruta and Charaka, and Persian medicine, in addition to aspects
of Chinese materia medica. Originally written in the Arabic language, the book
was later translated to a number of other languages during the Middle Ages,
including Persian, Latin and Chinese. The Canon is considered one of the most
famous books in the history of medicine.
Also
known as the Qanun, which means "law" in Arabic and Persian, the
Canon of Medicine remained a medical authority up until the 18th century and
early 19th century. It set the standards for medicine in Europe and the Islamic
world, and is Avicenna's most renowned written work alongside The Book of
Healing. Qanun was used at many medical schools—at University of Montpellier,
France, as late as 1650. Much of the book was also translated into Chinese as
the Hui Hui Yao Fang (Prescriptions of the Hui Nationality) by the Hui people
in Yuan China. The Canon also formed the basis of Unani medicine, a form of
traditional medicine practiced in India. The principles of medicine described
by him ten centuries ago in this book, are still taught at UCLA and Yale
University, among others, as part of the history of medicine.
The
Canon is considered the first pharmacopoeia, and among other things, the book
is known for the introduction of systematic experimentation and quantification
into the study of physiology, the discovery of the contagious nature of
infectious diseases, the introduction of quarantine to limit the spread of
contagious diseases, and the introduction of evidence-based medicine,
experimental medicine, clinical trials, randomized controlled trials, efficacy
tests, clinical pharmacology, neuropsychiatry, physiological psychology, risk
factor analysis, and the idea of a syndrome in the diagnosis of specific
diseases.
The
Arabic text of the Persian Qanun was translated into Latin as Canon medicinae
by Gerard of Cremona in the 12th century and into Hebrew in 1279. Henceforth
the Canon served as the chief guide to medical science in the West and is said
to have influenced Leonardo da Vinci. Its encyclopedic content, its systematic
arrangement and philosophical plan soon worked its way into a position of
pre-eminence in the medical literature of Europe, displacing the works of Galen
and becoming the text book for medical education in the schools of Europe. The
text was read in the medical schools at Montpellier and Leuven as late as 1650,
and Arnold C. Klebs described it as "one of the most significant
intellectual phenomena of all times." In the words of Dr. William Osler,
the Qanun has remained "a medical bible for a longer time than any other
work". The first three books of the Latin Canon were printed in 1472, and
a complete edition appeared in 1473. The 1491 Hebrew edition is the first
appearance of a medical treatise in Hebrew and the only one produced during the
15th century. In the last 30 years of the 15th century it passed through 15
Latin editions.
In
recent years, a partial translation into English was made.
Almost
half of Avicenna's works are versified. His poems appear in both Arabic and
Persian. As an example,
Up
from Earth's Centre through the Seventh Gate,
I
rose, and on the Throne of Saturn sate,
And
many Knots unravel'd by the Road,
But
not the Master-Knot of Human Fate.
Avicenna
died in June 1037, in his fifty-eighth year, and was buried in Hamedan, Iran.
Source:
IBNA News Agency