Ahmed ibn Yusuf

Ahmed ibn Yusuf ibn Ibrahim ibn Tammam al-siddiq Al-Baghdadi also known as Abu Ja'far Ahmad ibn Yusuf and Ahmed ibn Yusuf al-misri (835 - 912) was an Arab mathematician, like his father Yusuf ibn Ibrahim (Arabic يوسف بن ابراهيم الصدَيق البغدادي ).

Life

Ahmed ibn Yusuf was born in Baghdad (today in Iraq) and moved with his father to Damascus in 839. He later moved to Cairo, but the exact date is unknown: since he was also known as "al-Misri", which means "the Egyptian", this probably happened at an early age. Eventually, he also died in Cairo. He probably grew up in a strongly intellectual environment: his father worked on Mathematics, Astronomy and Medicine, produced astronomical tables and was a member of a group of scholars. He achieved an important role in Egypt, which was caused by Egypt's relative independence from the Abbasid Caliph.

Work

For some of the work attributed to Ahmed, it is not exactly clear whether he wrote his, whether his father wrote it or whether they wrote it together. It is clear, however, that he worked on a book on ratio and proportion. This was translated to Latin by Gherard of Cremona and was a commentary of Euclid's "Elements". This book influenced early European mathematicians such as Fibonacci. Further, in "On similar arcs", he commented on Ptolemy's "Karpos" (or "Centiloquium"); many scholars believe that ibn Yusuf was in fact the true author of that work. [Richard Lemay, Origin and success of the "Kitab Thamara" of Abu Ja'far Ahmad ibn Yusuf, in "Proceedings of the 1st International Symposium for the History of Arabic Science, University of Aleppo (1976)", Aleppo 1978] He also wrote a book on the astrolabe. He invented methods to solve tax problems that were later presented in Fibonnacci's "Liber Abaci". He was also quoted by mathematicians such as Thomas Bradwardine, Jordanus de Nemore and Luca Pacioli.

References

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* H. L. L. Busard and P. S. van Koningsveld, "Der "Liber de arcubus similibus" des Ahmed ibn Jusuf", Annals of science 30 (1973), 381-406.
* M Steinschneider, Yusuf ben Ibrahim und Ahmed ibn Yusuf, Bibliotheca mathematica (1888), 49-117.

ee also

*List of Arab scientists and scholars