Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Khwarizmi

For other uses, see al-Khwārizmī.

Abū ʿAbdallāh Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Yūsuf al-Kātib al-Khwārizmī,^[1] also referred to as al-Balkhī, was a tenth century Persian encyclopedist and the author of the early encyclopedia Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm (“Key to the Sciences”) in the Arabic language.

Gerlof van Vloten, the editor of Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm 1895 publication in Leiden, mentions in a preface to Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm that nothing is known about al-Khwārizmī except his name and that he is also known as al-Balkhi, but Hossein Khadiv Jam, the Persian translator of Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm mentions that after a lot of searches he has found that al-Khwārizmī "was born in Balkh, lived in Nishapur, worked as a clerk in the Samanid court for a while, and has authored the book Mafātīḥ al-ʿulūm, one of the oldest Islamic encyclopedias, by the request of Abul-Hossein Atba, a vizier of Nuh II, in the Arabic language."

Notes

1. ^ Bosworth, p. 100

Further reading

• J. Vernet, "Al-Khuwārizmī, Abū ‘Abd Allāh Muḥammad Ibn Aḥmad Ibn Yūsuf", Dictionary of Scientific Biography.
• Hossein Khadiv Jam, The Translation of Mafatih al-'Ulum (ترجمهٔ مفاتیح‌العلوم), Sherkat-e Enteshaaraat-e Elmi va Farhangi, 1383 AP (circa 2004 CE).
• C. E. Bosworth, "A Pioneer Arabic Encyclopedia of the Sciences: Al Khwārizmī's Keys of the Sciences". Isis, Vol. 54, No. 1 (Mar., 1963), pp. 97-111.