Work A.2.2
Ptolemy
المقالات الأربع
Kitāb al-Arbaʿ maqālāt fī l-qaḍāʾ bi-l-nujūm ʿalā l-ḥawādith (tr. Ibrāhīm ibn al-Ṣalt/Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq)
The most widespread Arabic translation of the Tetrabiblos is probably a revision by Ḥunayn b. Isḥāq (d. 260/873) of a lost translation from the Greek by Ibrāhīm b. al-Ṣalt (around 138/800), who does not appear in the manuscripts but is mentioned by Ibn al-Nadīm and Ibn al-Qifṭī. The text was most likely written under the patronship of the Abbasid caliphs in Baghdad, where also the earliest commentaries were produced. All extant Arabic commentaries on the Tetrabiblos, and probably also the lost ones by Thābit b. Qurra (d. 288/901) and al-Nayrīzī (d. c. 309/922), are based on this version. The work comprises: Book I, 24 chapters on general astrological principles; Book II, 13 chapters on mundane astrology; Book III, 14 chapters, and Book IV, 9 chapters, both on individual astrology and nativities. Alternative titles: Kitāb al-Arbaʿ, al-Maqālāt al-arbaʿ, Kitāb al-Qaḍāʾ ʿalā l-ḥawādith, Kitāb li-l-Arbaʿ maqālāt li-Baṭlamyūs fī l-qaḍāʾ bi-l-nujūm ʿalā l-ḥawādith.
Note
Many manuscripts include additions by Thābit b. Qurra (d. 901) in the main text or in the margins; in some cases this leads to confusion in the incipits concerning the actual revisor of the work. In one instance the treatise is even misattributed to Thābit (London, BL, Or. 9115, which has Thabit ibn Kurrah. Arbaʿ maqālāt on the spine). The few witnesses without Thābit b. Qurra’s glosses appear to have been extracted from ʿAlī b. Riḍwān’s commentary (C.2.1050; cf. the colophon in Tehran, Millī Library, Ar. 747).
Text
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Bibl.
Ibn al-Nadīm, Fihrist (ed. FlügelGustav Flügel, Kitâb al-Fihrist, 2 vols, Leipzig: Vogel, 1871–1872, p. 268; German tr. SuterHeinrich Suter, ‘Das Mathematiker-Verzeichniss im Fihrist des Ibn Abî Jaʿḳûb an-Nadîm’, Zeitschrift für Mathematik und Physik. Supplement 37 (1892), pp. 1–87, p. 20, English tr. DodgeBayard Dodge, The Fihrist of al-Nadīm. A Tenth-Century Survey of Muslim Culture, 2 vols, New York / London: Columbia University Press, 1970, vol. II, p. 640); Ibn al-Qifṭī, Taʾrīkh al-ḥukamā (ed. LippertJulius Lippert, Ibn al-Qifṭī’s Taʾrīḫ al-ḥukamā, Leipzig: Dieterich, 1903, pp. 97–98); Hājjī Khalīfa, Kashf al-ẓunūn (ed. FlügelGustav Flügel, Kashf al-ẓunūn ʿan asāmī al-kutub wa-l-funūn. Lexicon bibliographicum et encyclopaedicum a Mustafa ben Abdallah Katib Jelebi dicto et nomine Haji Khalifa celebrato compositum, 7 vols, Leipzig / London: Bentley / Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland, 1835–1858, vol. VI, pp. 49–50; ed. YaltkayaŞerefettin Yaltkaya and Kilisli Rifat Bilge, Kashf al-ẓunūn ʿan asāmi l-kutub wa-l-funūn li-... Ḥajji Khalīfa ..., 2 vols, Istanbul: Maarif Matbaası, 1941–1943, vol. II, p. 1781; Ḥājjī Khalīfa mistakenly lists the author as Ḥunayn’s son Isḥāq b. Ḥunayn). — Moritz Steinschneider, Die arabischen Uebersetzungen aus dem Griechischen, Leipzig: Harrassowitz, 1897, pp. 207–209; SuterHeinrich Suter, Die Mathematiker und Astronomen der Araber und ihre Werke, Leipzig: Teubner, 1900, pp. 16–17, 20; Ernst Honigmann, Die sieben Klimata und die πόλεις ἐπίσημοι. Eine Untersuchung zur Geschichte der Geographie und Astrologie im Altertum und Mittelalter, Heidelberg: Winter, 1929, p. 116; GAS VIIFuat Sezgin, Geschichte des arabischen Schrifttums. Vol. VII: Astrologie – Meteorologie und Verwandtes bis ca. 430 H., Leiden: Brill, 1979, pp. 42–44, 134; Manfred Ullmann, Die Natur- und Geheimwissenschaften im Islam, Leiden: Brill, 1972, pp. 282–283; MAOSICBoris A. Rosenfeld and Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu, Mathematicians, Astronomers, and other Scholars of Islamic Civilization and their Works (7th–19th c.), Istanbul: Research Centre for Islamic History, Art and Culture (IRCICA), 2003, p. 58 (no. 114) (listed under Isḥāq b. Ḥunayn); Burnett, Charles, “Astrology”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE, edited by Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, and Everett Rowson. Consulted online on 19 June 2020 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1573-3912_ei3_COM_0162>. — Bojidar Dimitrov, ‘‘Fort. recte’: Witnesses to the Text of Ptolemy’s Tetrabiblos in Its Near Eastern Transmission’, in David Juste, Benno van Dalen, Dag Nikolaus Hasse and Charles Burnett (eds), Ptolemy’s Science of the Stars in the Middle Ages, Turnhout: Brepols, 2020, pp. 97–113.
Ed.
An edition of all four books, together with the version by al-Biṭrīq/ʿUmar b. al-Farrukhān (A.2.1), is in preparation by Keiji Yamamoto/Taro Mimura.