ABSTRACT

From the middle of the eighth century to the tenth century, almost all non-literary and non-historical secular Greek books, including such diverse topics as astrology, alchemy, physics, botany and medicine, that were not available throughout the eastern Byzantine Empire and the Near East, were translated into Arabic.
Greek Thought, Arabic Culture explores the major social, political and ideological factors that occasioned the unprecedented translation movement from Greek into Arabic in Baghdad, the newly founded capital of the Arab dynasty of the 'Abbasids', during the first two centuries of their rule. Dimitri Gutas draws upon the preceding historical and philological scholarship in Greco-Arabic studies and the study of medieval translations of secular Greek works into Arabic and analyses the social and historical reasons for this phenomenon.
Dimitri Gutas provides a stimulating, erudite and well-documented survey of this key movement in the transmission of ancient Greek culture to the Middle Ages.

chapter |8 pages

Introduction

The Graeco-Arabic Translation Movement as a Social and Historical Phenomenon

part |96 pages

Translation and Empire

chapter |17 pages

The Background of the Translation Movement

Material, Human, and Cultural Resources

chapter |33 pages

Al-Manṣūr

Early ‘Abbāsid Imperial Ideology and the Translation Movement

chapter |14 pages

Al-Mahdī and his Sons

Social and Religious Discourse and the Translation Movement

chapter |30 pages

Al-Ma'mūn

Domestic and Foreign Policies and the Translation Movement

part |82 pages

Translation and Society

chapter |36 pages

Translation and History

Developments from the Translation Movement

chapter |6 pages

Epilogue