Avicenna

Avicenna (Arabic Ibn Sina), a famous Arabian philosopher and physician, was born 980, near Bokhara, his father being a Persian tax-collector. He studied with singular zeal and success the Koran, mathematics, astronomy, the philosophy of Aristotle, and medicine. He was physician to several of the Samanide and Dilemite sultans, and also for some time vizier in Hamadan, where, after some years of retirement at Ispahan, he died in 1037. His works are based on those of the Greeks, whom he knew only through Arabic translations. His medical system, the Canon, long remained the standard of teaching and practice. His philosophy was Aristotelianism modified by Neoplatonic elements. Of his numerous writings, the chief, both medical and philosophical, were translated into Latin as early as 1493, and often reprinted.