Al-Karaji

Abu Bakr ibn Muhammad ibn al-Husayn Al-Karaji (953 – 1029), also known as Al-karkhi was a Persian mathematician and engineer.

He wrote the Al-Fakhri and dedicated it to the ruler of Baghdad.

Mathematics historian F Woepcke in Extrait du Fakhri, traité d'Algèbre par Abou Bekr Mohammed Ben Alhacan Alkarkhi (Paris, 1853), describes Karaji's work as the first appearance of "the theory of algebraic calculus".

Historian R Rashed in The development of Arabic mathematics : between arithmetic and algebra (London, 1994) writes:

"the more-or-less explicit aim of al-Karaji's exposition was to find the means of realising the autonomy and specificity of algebra, so as to be in a position to reject, in particular, the geometric representation of algebraic operations".

"Al-Karaji's work holds an especially important place in the history of mathematics. ... the discovery and reading of the arithmetical work of Diophantus, in the light of the algebraic conceptions and methods of al-Khwarizmi and other Arab algebraists, made possible a new departure in algebra by Al-Karaji ..."

External link

• St Andrew's School of Mathematics biography of Karaji

See also

• List of Iranian scientists