Great scientific contributions of Muslims

The greatest contribution of these scholars is in mathematics. They founded Algebra; made Trigonometry an independent branch of mathematics; and achieved tremendous advances in other fields like Geometry and spherical geometry etc. In this case too the impetus for the development was provided by the Message.  Al-Khwarizmi the founder of Algebra, was the first mathematician to work on the details of 'Arithmetic and Algebra of inheritance' besides the systematisation of the theory of quadratic equations. His treatise entitled 'Hisab Al-jabr wal muqabala', enjoyed tremendous popularity in the medieval West for centuries. Tabit ibn Qurrah of ninth century, who had translated the works of Eu­clid, Apollonius, Archimedes, and Ptolemy was another fine mathe­matician himself. The only surviving fragment of his original work contains an exceptionally brilliant chapter on the solution and properties of cubic equations.

Umar Khayyam, the famous poet, was another great mathemati­cian. He invented the second and third degree of quadratic equa­tions. The efforts of these mathematicians become all the more re­markable when we realise that they had not yet developed the sym­bolic algebra. Even for third degree equations, Khayyam had to write his problems and procedural steps in words and sentences.”

The algebraic symbols were introduced quite late. Al-Banna and Al-Marrakushi used them in thirteenth and fourteenth century. Later mathematicians like Qunfudh's and Al-Qalasadi's works of fourteenth and fifteenth century show quite a developed system of symbols for operations en­tailing extraction of square roots, exponentiation, and for un­known quantities in algebraic equations.

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See also: Glimpses of Renowned Scientists and Thinkers of Muslim Era