Prophet Muhammad dies and Abu Bakr becomes first caliph, or Muslim ruler.
Al-Shifa is appointed the first female health and safety minister by Umar, second
caliph, in the city of Madinah and then in Basrah
Islam spreads to
Persia, Palestine, Syria,
Lebanon, and Iraq,
and later to Egypt.
A windmill powering a millstone is built in Persia.
Islam has spread to all of North Africa.
The Umayyad dynasty rules the caliphate from Damascus.
Building begins of the Dome of the Rock Mosque in Jerusalem.
Islam reaches Spain.
Jabir ibn Hayyan is born. He is considered the “father of chemistry.”
Abbasids overthrow the Umayyads and in 762 build a new capital in Baghdad. Spain is ruled by an Umayyad family descendant.
Jabir ibn Hayyan is born. He is considered the “father of chemistry.”
Mathematician Al-Khwarizmi is born. His book Algebr wal Muqabala developed modern algebra.
King Offa mints a Gold Mancus coin, imitating the gold dinar of Caliph Al-Mansur.
Caliph Harun al-Rashid establishes the House of Wisdom in Baghdad.
Building begins of the Great Mosque of Córdoba.
First mention of a paper mill in Baghdad.
Caliph Harun al-Rashid presents Charlemagne with a clock that strikes the hour.
Al-Kindi is born. He was a mathematician, philosopher, physicist, chemist, and musician.
Caliph Al-Ma’mum expands the House of Wisdom; the translation movement intensifies.
Abu Mansur opens Al-Shammasiyah Observatory, near Baghdad.
Banu Musa bothers publish their Book of Ingenious Devices.
Astronomer Al-Battani is born. He determined astronomical measurements with accuracy.
Al-Qarawiyin University in Fez is completed by Fatima al-Fihri.
Al-Razi (Rhazes) is born. A physician, chemist, and medical teacher, he is considered the “father of clinical and experimental medicine.” His writings were later translated into Latin.
Ahmad ibn Toloun, Abbasid governor of Egypt, establishes a hospital in Cairo known to be the first to include a department for mental diseases.
Physician and inspector of Baghdad hospitals Sinan ibn Thabit ibn Qurra is born. He started mobile hospital services for rural and Bedouin areas.
Abbas ibn Firnas, pioneer of unpowered flight, dies in Córdoba.
Ibn al-Jazzar al-Qayrawani (Aljizar) is born. He wrote the first independent book on pediatrics and social pediatrics: Risalah fi Siyasat as-Sibyan wa Tadbirihim (A Treatise on Infant and Child Care and Treatment).
Fatimids rule Egypt and North Africa, then, nine years later, Sicily.
Abbasid Caliph Al-Muqtader issues the first licensing regulation for medical practice. He established the hospital of Al-Muqtadiri in Bab al-Sham in Baghdad; his mother established Al-Sayyida Hospital in Souq Yehia in Baghdad.
Surgeon Al-Zahrawi (Albucasis) is born in Córdoba. He refined the science of surgery, invented dozens of surgical instruments, and wrote the first illustrated surgical book.
Al-Farabi from Baghdad dies. A philosopher and musician, he invented the ancestor of the violin.
Cartographer and writer Al-Masudi describes his visit to the oil fields of Baku.
Physicist Ibn al-Haytham is born. His discoveries and theories revolutionized optics.
Labna, a mathematician and scientist, is appointed private secretary to the Umayyad caliph, Al-Hakim in Córdoba.
Al-Azhar University is founded by the Fatimids in Cairo.
Al-Biruni is born. The polymath, astronomer, mathematician, and geographer measured the circumference of Earth.
Prince of physicians Ibn Sina (Avicenna) is born. He wrote the influencial Canon of Medicine.
Sutaita al-Mahamli, a mathematician and expert witness in courts, dies in Baghdad.
Building begins of Bab Mardum Mosque in Toledo, which uses a unique form of rib vaulting.
Astronomers Ibn Yunus dies in Cairo, leaving thousands of accurate records, including 40 planetary conjunctions and 30 lunar eclipses.
Constantine the African moves from Tunisia to Salerno initiating the transfer of Islamic medicine to Europe.
The Nizamiyya madrasa, the first school in Baghdad, is established by Nizam al-Mulk, the Seljuk minister who appointed distinguished philosopher and theologian Al-Ghazali as a professor.
The Norman Conquest of England begins a flow of Muslim motifs and ideas into that country.
Christians take Toledo. A center at Toledo is established, translating Arabic books into Latin. Ibn Bassal’s Book of Agriculture revolutionizes farming. He is from Toledo, Spain.
Abu Marwan ibn Zuhr (Avenzoar) is born. He is a pioneer of experimental surgery and co-author, with Ibn Rushd (Averroes), of an original encyclopedic medical text. His two daughters became doctors.
The first Crusades begin.
Al-Idrisi is born. He produced a world map for Norman King Roger II of Sicily.
Ibn Tufal, author of Hayy ibn Yaqzan, is born.
Ibn Rushd (Averroes) is born. He wrote an extensive corpus of philosophy in which he stated significant theories in epistemology, natural philosophy, and metaphysics. An accomplished physician, he wrote the famous treatise Al-Kulliyat fi al-tib, known in Latin as the Colliget.
Daniel of Morley travels to Córdoba to learn mathematics and astronomy, returning to lecture at Oxford.
Robert of Chester translate the Qur’an and works of Al-Khwarizmi.
Jabir ibn Aflah invents an observational instrument known as the torquetum, a mechanical device to convert between spherical coordinate systems.
Nur al-Din Zangi establishes Al-Nuri Hospital in Damascus, a large teaching hospital.
Temple Church is built in London by the Templars, imitating the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem.
Queen Dhaifa Khatoon is born in Aleppo, Syria. She was the daughter-in-law to Saladin, and a supporter of science and learning.
Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi (Saladin) regains Jerusalem. He established Al-Nasiri Hospital in Cairo.
Botanist Ibn al-Baytar is born in Málaga. He wrote a famous pharmacopeia.
Leonardo of Pisa, known as Fibonacci, introduces Arabic numerals and mathematics to Europe in his book Liber Abaci.
Al-Jazari completes his Book of Ingenious Mechanical Devices.
Ibn al-Nafis is born. He was a scholar of jurisprudence and doctor who was first to discover pulmonary circulation. He wrote Al-Seerah al-Kamiliyah refuting the ideas of Ibn Tufayl’s novel Hayy ibn Yaqzan on the oneness of existence.
Robert Grosseteste, who studied in Córdoba, becomes first chancellor of Oxford University. He was elected bishop of Lincoln in 1253.
Ibn al-Quff is born. A Christian surgeon and author, he continued Al-Zahrawi’s efforts to develop surgery as a science and independent medical speciality. He wrote Kitab al-Umda fi al-Jirahah (The Main Pillars of Surgery).
Mamluk dynasty rules Egypt after the Ayyubids and later defeats the Mongols.
King Alfonso el Sabio establishes Latin and Arabic colleges in Seville and commissions the translation of Arabic texts.
Queen Eleanor, Castilian bride of King Edward I, brings Andalusian carpets to England in her dowry.
Ibn abi al-Mahasin al-Halabi writes his comprehensive scholarly and illustrated work on eye diseases, Al-Kafi fi al-Kuhl (The Book of Sufficient Knowledge in Ophthalmology).
Mongols devastate and rule Baghdad and coquer Syria.
Roger Bacon publishes Secrets of Art and Nature praising influences of Muslim scholars.
Marco Polo starts his 24-year journey.
Al-Mansuri Hospital Cairo is completed after 11 months of construction.
The first paper mill outside Islamic Spain in Europe is established in Bologna.
The Ecumenical Council of Vienne decides to establish schools of Arabic and Islamic studies at universities in Paris, Oxford, Bologna, and Salamanca.
Ibn Battuta leaves Tangier on his 29-year journey.
Giotto’s painting “Madonna and Child” uses tiraz, bands of Arabic inscriptions, which mark loyal garments and other textiles from the Muslim world.
Ibn Khaldun, the “Father of Sociology”, is born.
The Black Death reaches Alexandria and Cairo from Europe.
Emir Mohammed V builds the Lion Fountain, a water-powered clock, in the Alhambra.
Chemist Maryam al-Zanatiyeh dies in Qarawiyin, Tunisia.
Serafeddin Sabuncuoglu is born. An Ottoman surgeon, he continued the work of Al-Zahrawi and Ibn al-Quff by writing an independent surgical textbook.
Muslim Zheng He starts his seven epic sea voyages from China. In the largest wooden boats the world had seen, he established China as a leading power in the Indian Ocean, brought back exotic species like the giraffe, and drew tribute from many nations.
Ahmed Ibn Majid is born in Arabia. He was a master navigator and is said to have guided Vasco da Gama from South Africa to India. (Cape of Good Hope)
Ulugh Beg publishes his star catalog.
Leonardo Da Vinci is born. He was a major contributor to the foundation of the Renaissance.
Koca Mimar Sinan is born. A renowned architect, he built Turkey’s Selimiye and Suleymaniye mosques, as well as many others.
Christopher Columbus lands in the New World.
Venice publishes a translation of Al-Tasrif by Al-Zahrawi. Basel and Oxford follow suit.
Piri Reis constructs the earliest known map showing America.
Nicolaus Copernicus publishes De Revolutionibus, drawing on the work of Nasir al-Din al-Tusi and Ibn al-Shatir.
The first German, and probably European, observatory is built in Kassel.
Johannes Kepler is born. He drew on the work of Ibn al-Haytham in his work on optics.
Istanbul observatory of Taqi al-Din is founded. It will close a few years later, in 1580.
The Canon of Ibn Sina is printed in Rome and, along with Al-Hawi by Al-Razi, becomes a standard text in the European medical curriculum.
Edward Pococke is born. He spent five years in Aleppo learning Arabic; he also translated Hayy ibn Yaqzan, a precursor to Robinson Crusoe.
Edmund Castell is born. He lectured on the use of Avicenna’s medical work. For more than 18 years, he compiled a dictionary of seven Asian languages.
Polish astronomer Johannes Hevelius is born. In the frontispiece of his Selenographia (Gdansk, 1647), he depicted Ibn al-Haytham as symbolizing knowledge through reason, and Galileo Galilei as symbolizing knowledge through the senses.
John Wallis is born. A renowned mathematician and member of the Royal Society in London, he translated and lectured on the work of Arabic mathematicians. He included Al-Tusi’s work in his Opera Mathematica.
Robert Boyle, England’s most famous chemist, is born. He sought Arabic manuscripts and had them translated.
Lagari Hasan Celebi flies the first manned rocket over the Bosporus.
King Charles I requests that the Levant Company send home Arabic manuscripts on every ship returning to England.
Isaac Newton is born. He kept a copy of the Latin translation of Ibn al-Haytham’s Book of Optics in his library.
Turkish merchants bring coffee to the United Kingdom.
Scientist and astronomer Edmund Halley is born. He translated Arabic editions of Greek mathematics and researched observations of Al-Battani.
At the request of Hevelius, the Royal Society agrees to translate the astronomical manuscript of Ulugh Beg from Persian to Latin in its entirety.
John Greeves publishes a paper in the Royal Society Philosophical Transactions on Egyptian’s use of large ovens to hatch thousands of chicken eggs at a time.
Moroccan ambassador to London Muhammed Ibn Haddu is elected a fellow of the Royal Society in London.
Lady Mary Montagu tests smallpox inoculation in Britain, having witnessed the practice in Turkey.
Moroccan ambassador to London Mohammed Ben Ali Abgali is elected a fellow of the Royal Society in London.
Tripoli ambassador in England Cassem Aga writes about the widespread practice of smallpox inoculation in North Africa and is elected a fellow of Royal Society in London.
Edward Jenner tests inoculation with cowpox.
