Detail from Albrecht Dürer’s 1515 woodcut map of the northern constellations depicting the Persian astronomer Abū
al-Ḥusayn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿUmar al-Ṣūfī who was commonly known by European astronomers as
Azophi Arabus
Al-Ṣūfī wrote on alchemy, astrology and mathematics but he is best known for his works on astronomy.
His best-known astronomical work is the Kitāb
Ṣuwar al-Kawākib al-Thābitah (“Book of the Constellations of the Fixed Stars”) which he completed
in Shīrāz around 964. The work was dedicated to the Buyid ruler Abū Shujāʿ Fannā Khusraw, entitled
ʿAdud al-Dawlah (936-983 [324-372 H]), who was a
friend and a pupil of al-Ṣūfī and whose court was seated at Shīrāz (until 977/78) and Baghdād. Originally
written in Arabic, it was later translated into Persian and also into Castilian and Latin.
The stellar coordinates are based on Ptolemy’s values, precessed to the epoch 1276 Alexander [1 October 964] by adding
12° 42' to the ecliptic longitudes.
Al-Ṣūfī’s work was the basis of the star catalogue (epoch 1437) in the Zīj-i-Ṣultānī of the
Timurid ruler Ulugh Bēg (1394-1449), who used the Persian
translation made around 1250 in Marāgha by
Naṣīr al-Dīn
al-Ṭūsī (1201-1274), court astronomer of Hūlagū Khān (c. 1217-1265).
Al-Ṣūfī’s stellar nomenclature was also adopted on the 34-cm celestial globe published after the mid-1640s
in Amsterdam by Jacob Aertsz Colom (1599-1673) in collaboration with the Leiden oriental scholar and astronomer
Jacob Golius (1596-1667).
He also compiled a comprehensive work in 1760 chapters on the astrolabe and its use of which only a shorter
version in 170 chapters is now extant.
The lunar crater Azophi and the minor planet
12621 Alsufi are named in his honour.
Biographical Sources on al-Ṣūfī
Moritz Steinschneider, “Ueber die Mondstationen (Naxatra), und das Buch Arcandam”, Zeitschrift der Deutschen
Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, 18 (1864), 118-201 [cf. p. 140]
[MENAdoc link].
Moritz Steinschneider, “Zur Geschichte der Uebersetzungen aus dem Indischen ins Arabische und ihres Einflusses auf die
arabische Literatur; insbesondere über die Mondstationen (Naxatra) und darauf bezügliche Loosbücher”, Zeitschrift der
Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, 25 (1871), 378-428
[MENAdoc link].
Heinrich Suter, “Das Mathematiker-Verzeichniss im Fihrist des Ibn Abî Ja‘ḳûb an-Nadîm: Zum ersten Mal
vollständig ins Deutsche überstetzt und mit Anmerkungen versehen”, Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der Mathematik,
6 [= supplement to Zeitschrift für Mathematik und Physik, 37] (1892), 1-87 [cf.
pp. 40 & 74]
[MENAdoc link] –
reprinted in: Heinrich Suter: Beiträge zur Geschichte der Mathematik und Astronomie im Islam (Frankfurt am Main:
Institut für Geschichte der arabisch-islamischen Wissenschaften, 1986), vol. 1, pp. 315-404.
Heinrich Suter, “Die Mathematiker und Astronomen der Araber und ihre Werke”, Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der
mathematischen Wissenschaften mit Einschluß ihrer Anwendungen, 10 [= supplement to Zeitschrift für Mathematik
und Physik, 45] (1900), pp. 62-63 [nr. 138] [MENAdoc link] – reprinted in: Heinrich Suter: Beiträge zur
Geschichte der Mathematik und Astronomie im Islam (Frankfurt am Main: Institut für Geschichte der arabisch-islamischen
Wissenschaften, 1986), vol. 1, pp. 1-285.
Heinrich Suter, “Nachträge und Berichtigungen zu “Die Mathematiker und Astronomen der Araber und ihre Werke””,
Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der mathematischen Wissenschaften mit Einschluss ihrer Anwendungen, 14 [= supplement
to Zeitschrift für Mathematik und Physik] (1902), 155-185
[cf. p. 166 [nr. 138]] [MENAdoc link]
– reprinted in: Heinrich Suter: Beiträge zur Geschichte der Mathematik und Astronomie
im Islam (Frankfurt am Main: Institut für Geschichte der arabisch-islamischen Wissenschaften, 1986), vol. 1,
pp. 286-314.
Heinrich Suter, “‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. ‘Umar al-Ṣūfī”, in: The Encyclopaedia of
Islam (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1913), vol. I, p. 57.
Carl Brockelmann, Geschichte der arabischen Literatur: Erster Supplementband (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1937),
vol. 1, p. 398 [addenda in Dritter Supplementband, 1206].
Carl Brockelmann, Geschichte der arabischen Literatur: Zweite den Supplementbänden angepasste Auflage
(Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1943), vol. 1, pp. 253-254.
Charles Ambrose Storey, Persian Literature: A Bio-Bibliographical Survey (London: Luzac & Co., Ltd., 1958),
vol. II, part 1, pp. 41-42 [nr. 75].
Aydın Sayılı, The Observatory in Islam and its Place in the General History of the Observatory (Ankara: Türk Tarih
Kumuru Basımevi, 1960 [= Publications of the Turkish Historical Society, Series VII, nr. 38]), pp. 104-107 –
reprinted in 1981 by Arno Press (New York) and in 1998 by the Institute for the History of Arabic-Islamic Science (Frankfurt
am Main).
Samuel Miklos Stern, “‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. ‘Umar al-Ṣūfī”, in: The Encyclopaedia of Islam:
New Edition (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1960), vol. I, pp. 86-87.
Bayard Dodge, The Fihrist of al-Nadīm: A Tenth-Century Survey of Muslim Culture (New York/London: Columbia University
Press, 1970 [= Records of Civilization: Sources and Studies, nr. LXXXIII]), vol. II, pp. 669-670.
Fuat Sezgin, Geschichte des arabischen Schrifttums: Band V. Mathematik bis ca. 430 H (Leiden:
E.J. Brill, 1974), pp. 309-310 & 426.
Paul Kunitzsch, “al-Ṣūfī”, in: C.C. Gillespie (ed.), Dictionary of Scientific Biography (New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1976), vol. XIII, pp. 149-150.
Fuat Sezgin, Geschichte des arabischen Schrifttums: Band VI. Astronomie bis ca. 430 H (Leiden:
E.J. Brill, 1978), pp. 212-215.
Fuat Sezgin, Geschichte des arabischen Schrifttums: Band VII. Astrologie, Meteorologie und Verwandtes bis
ca. 430 H (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1979), pp. 168-169.
Paul Kunitzsch, “ʿAbd-al-Raḥmān b. ʿOmar Ṣūfī”, in: Encyclopædia Iranica
(London [etc.]: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982), vol. 1, pp. 148-149
[EI link].
Galina Pavlovna Matvievskaia, “Abd ar-Rachman as-Sufi i ego rol’ v istorii astronomii [‘Abd al-Raḥmān
al-Ṣūfī and his Role in the History of Astronomy]”, Istoriko-Astronomicheskie Issledovaniia, 16
(1983), 92-138 [ADS link].
Cengis Aydın, “Abdurrahman es-Sûfî”, in: İslâm Ansiklopedisi [TDV Enclopedia of Islam] (Ankara:
Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı, 1988), vol. 1, pp. 172-173 [online link / pdf link].
Boris A. Rosenfeld & 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, 2003
[= Series of Studies and Sources on History of Science, nr. 11]), pp. 86-87 [§ 212].
Boris A. Rosenfeld, “A Supplement to Mathematicians, Astronomers, and other Scholars of Islamic Civilisation and
their Works (7th-19th c.)”, Suhayl: International Journal for the History of the Exact and Natural Sciences in
Islamic Civilisation, 4 (2004), 87-139 [Suhayl link] [cf. p. 91 [§ 212]].
Paul Kunitzsch, “Ṣūfī: Abū al-Ḥusayn ‘Abd-al-Raḥmān ibn ‘Umar al-Ṣūfī”,
in: Th. Hockey (ed.), The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers (New York: Springer, 2007), vol. 2, p. 1110
[Springer link].
Paul Kunitzsch, “‘Abd-al-Raḥmān al-Ṣūfī”, in: The Encyclopaedia of Islam Three
(Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2008), vol. 1, pp. 9-12 [Brill link].
Ihsan Hafez, ‘Abd al-Raḥmān al-Ṣūfī and His Book of the Fixed Stars: A Journey of Re-Discovery
(Cairns/Townsville: James Cook University, 2010), pp. 46-77 [ADS link].
Paul Kunitzsch, “Ṣūfī: Abū al-Ḥusayn ‘Abd-al-Raḥmān ibn ‘Umar
al-Ṣūfī”, in: Th. Hockey (ed.), The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers: Second Edition (New York:
Springer, 2014), vol. 4, pp. 2104-2105
[Springer link].
Robert Harry van Gent, “Ṣūfī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, al-”, in: I. Kalin, S. Ayduz &
C. Dali (eds.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Science, and Technology in Islam (New York: Oxford University Press USA,
2014), vol. 2, pp. 286-288 [pdf link].
Acknowledgements: I am grateful to Alasdair Watson (Bodleian Library, Oxford) for improvements and additions.
