![]() ![]() could appear, for translation by medieval Christians, in the Arabic libraries of cities thousands of miles away (and nearly a millennium later) from their first being written down. ![]() A cursory glance to the preceding events will, hopefully, shed some light on how, for example, the works of a pagan Greek thinker from the 5th century B.C. First, how so many great works of philosophy and science came to be preserved there, secondly, why in particular the Arabic rulers felt inclined to sponsor and support such scholarly activity, thirdly, how the technical means for such bibliographic work developed there, and finally, why there existed such a contrast of wealth between the libraries of Christendom and those of Islam? While a detailed account of these contextual questions is clearly beyond the scope of this essay, it is important for the sake of coherence to at least sketch the scope of events leading up to the establishment of such a diverse and involved literary culture in Islamic Spain during the Abbasid and Umayyad periods (711-1031). The chain of events which culminated in the establishment of the Great Mosque library of Cordoba in the 10th century, and the pilgrimages made thence by so many European scholars beg the following questions. P., 'The Historical Context of Arabic Translation, Learning, and The Libraries of Medieval Andalusia', Library History, Vol. ![]() Update: The three nodes in this series have actually been published now. ![]()
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