Al-Jabr
Seminal Arabic treatise on algebra (c. 820 CE) / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dear Wikiwand AI, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:
Can you list the top facts and stats about The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing?
Summarize this article for a 10 year old
Al-Jabr (Arabic: الجبر), also known as The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing (Arabic: الكتاب المختصر في حساب الجبر والمقابلة, al-Kitāb al-Mukhtaṣar fī Ḥisāb al-Jabr wal-Muqābalah;[lower-alpha 2] or Latin: Liber Algebræ et Almucabola), is an Arabic mathematical treatise on algebra written in Baghdad around 820 by the Persian polymath Al-Khwarizmi. It was a landmark work in the history of mathematics, with its title being the ultimate etymology of the word "algebra" itself, later borrowed into Medieval Latin as algebrāica.
Author | Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi |
---|---|
Original title | كتاب المختصر في حساب الجبر والمقابلة |
Illustrator | Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi |
Country | Abbasid Caliphate |
Language | Arabic |
Subject | Algebra[lower-alpha 1] |
Genre | Mathematics |
Publication date | 820 |
Original text | كتاب المختصر في حساب الجبر والمقابلة at Arabic Wikisource |
Translation | The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing at Wikisource |
Al-Jabr provided an exhaustive account of solving for the positive roots of polynomial equations up to the second degree.[1]: 228 [lower-alpha 3] It was the first text to teach elementary algebra, and the first to teach algebra for its own sake.[lower-alpha 4] It also introduced the fundamental concept of "reduction" and "balancing" (which the term al-jabr originally referred to), the transposition of subtracted terms to the other side of an equation, i.e. the cancellation of like terms on opposite sides of the equation.[lower-alpha 5] Mathematics historian Victor J. Katz regards Al-Jabr as the first true algebra text that is still extant.[lower-alpha 6] Translated into Latin by Robert of Chester in 1145, it was used until the sixteenth century as the principal mathematical textbook of European universities.[4][lower-alpha 7][6][7]
Several authors have also published texts under this name, including Abu Hanifa Dinawari, Abu Kamil, Abū Muḥammad al-ʿAdlī, Abū Yūsuf al-Miṣṣīṣī, 'Abd al-Hamīd ibn Turk, Sind ibn ʿAlī, Sahl ibn Bišr, and Šarafaddīn al-Ṭūsī.