Egypt
Science Daily
- From Red To Med
Saudi Aramco World (John Cooper) With map and photos. It is the year 638 ce, the "Year of Ashes" on the Arabian Peninsula, which is beset by a terrible drought. Just six years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, the holy cities of Makkah...
- Nile Bride Sacrifice A Myth
Egypt Daily Star News (Ahmed Maged) The ancient Egyptian custom of offering a virgin as a sacrifice to the river Nile every year to instigate a flood is a big historical error, Egyptology researcher Bassam El Shammaa told Daily News Egypt. “The myth...
- Book Review: Napoleon’s Egypt
New York Times (Review by Tom Reiss) “Napoleon’s Egypt” by Juan Cole In early 1798 the Directory, the oligarchy that was ruling revolutionary France, ordered its top general, Napoleon Bonaparte, to plan the invasion of England. Instead, Napoleon...
- Seeing Monuments In Their Original Light
BBC News An interesting piece looking at new software which shows how ancient buildings would have looked when illuminated by their original lighting, which has applications throughout many areas of archaeology. The software maps lighting details onto...
- More On Medieval Arab Scholars Re Cleopatra
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20041213/cleopatra.html I posted about this on November 9th, when Radio Netherlands published an article on the subject at http://www2.rnw.nl/rnw/en/features/science/10631355. Okasha el Daly's work identified...
Egypt
The 'Mad' 11th Century Egyptian Scholar Who Proved Aristotle Wrong
Science Daily
Ibn al-Haytham's 11th-century Book of Optics, which was published exactly 1000 years ago, is often cited alongside Newton's Principia as one of the most influential books in physics. Yet very little is known about the writer, considered by many to be the father of modern optics.
January's Physics World features a fanciful re-imagining of the 10-year period in the life of the medieval Muslim polymath, written by Los Angeles-based science writer Jennifer Ouellette.
The feature covers the time when al-Haytham -- banished from society and deprived of books -- came up with his revolutionary theories about the form and passage of light.
Ouellette brings detail to the skeletal plot of al-Haytham's life, from the awe and intimidation felt when he was summoned by the Caliph to use his engineering prowess to overcome the annual flooding of the Nile, to his fear of punishment when he realised he had failed in his task.
Al-Haytham was only able to escape a death sentence from the notoriously brutal Caliph by pretending he had gone mad. The Caliph instead incarcerated Al-Haytham, imprisoning him under house arrest to a cell. Confined and alone, it was here that Al-Haytham carried out the work that was to make him famous.
- From Red To Med
Saudi Aramco World (John Cooper) With map and photos. It is the year 638 ce, the "Year of Ashes" on the Arabian Peninsula, which is beset by a terrible drought. Just six years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, the holy cities of Makkah...
- Nile Bride Sacrifice A Myth
Egypt Daily Star News (Ahmed Maged) The ancient Egyptian custom of offering a virgin as a sacrifice to the river Nile every year to instigate a flood is a big historical error, Egyptology researcher Bassam El Shammaa told Daily News Egypt. “The myth...
- Book Review: Napoleon’s Egypt
New York Times (Review by Tom Reiss) “Napoleon’s Egypt” by Juan Cole In early 1798 the Directory, the oligarchy that was ruling revolutionary France, ordered its top general, Napoleon Bonaparte, to plan the invasion of England. Instead, Napoleon...
- Seeing Monuments In Their Original Light
BBC News An interesting piece looking at new software which shows how ancient buildings would have looked when illuminated by their original lighting, which has applications throughout many areas of archaeology. The software maps lighting details onto...
- More On Medieval Arab Scholars Re Cleopatra
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20041213/cleopatra.html I posted about this on November 9th, when Radio Netherlands published an article on the subject at http://www2.rnw.nl/rnw/en/features/science/10631355. Okasha el Daly's work identified...