Abu Mansur al-Qumri: Pioneering Contributions to Medieval Medicine

Abu Mansur al-Hasan ibn Nuh al-Qumri, a prominent 10th-century Persian physician, is best known for his medical compendium “Ghina Wa Muna” (Book of Wealth and Wishes). However, his contributions extend beyond this well-known work. Among his other significant medical texts is “Al-Tanwir,” a lesser-known manuscript believed to encompass various medical topics, though specific details remain scarce due to limited documentation.

Another key work attributed to al-Qumri is “The Causes of Maladies,” also known as “ʻIlal al-ʻilal.” This text delved into the etiology of diseases, offering insights into the underlying causes of various ailments. Unfortunately, like many ancient manuscripts, it has been lost, making its full impact on the medical field difficult to assess.

Al-Qumri's influence was profound, not only during his lifetime but also on future generations. His scholarly output contributed significantly to the foundation of medical knowledge, with his works being highly regarded by his contemporaries. One of his most notable students was the illustrious Avicenna, who later became a towering figure in the history of medicine. Al-Qumri's legacy, though partly obscured by time, remains a vital link in the chain of medical advancement.
Abu Mansur al-Qumri: Pioneering Contributions to Medieval Medicine

Works of Hibat Allah Abu'l-Barakat al-Baghdaadi

Abu'l-Barakāt Hibat Allah ibn Malkā al-Baghdādī (1080 – 1164 or 1165 CE) was a scholar of the Arabic-Islamic tradition. He wrote Kitab al-Mu'tabar.

His Hebrew birth name was Nathanel, before converting from Judaism to Islam at some point in his life. He served the Saljuq sultan Ḡīāṯ-al-dīn Moḥammad Tapar (d. 511/1118) and wrote a treatise for him. The sultan accused him of treating him improperly and imprisoned him for some time.

Kitab al-Mu'tabar is based on a collection of notes on logic, physics and metaphysics that Abu'l-Barakat composed for himself; some of those notes were copied verbatim from works of other philosophers, notably Avicenna.

Abu'l-Barakāt in many respects followed Avicenna, but also developed his own ideas. He proposed an explanation of the acceleration of falling bodies by the accumulation of successive increments of power with successive increments of velocity, anticipating Newton's second law of motion.
Works of Hibat Allah Abu'l-Barakat al-Baghdaadi

Avicenna

Avicenna (Arabic full name Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Al-Hasan ibn Ali ibn Sīnā c. 980 – June 1037) was a Persian polymath who is regarded as one of the most significant thinkers and writers of the Islamic Golden Age. He was the greatest physician in Islam.

He was born in Afsana, a village near Bukhara, the capital of the Samanids, a Persian dynasty in Central Asia and Greater Khorasan.

Avicenna memorized the Quran by the age of ten, and as an adult, he wrote five treatises commenting on suras from the Quran.

Avicenna’s independent thought was served by an extraordinary intelligence and memory, which allowed him to overtake his teacher at the age of fourteen. He wrote his first book, a compendium entitled Majmu (Compedium) at the age of 21.

About 100 treatises were ascribed to Avicenna. Some of them are tracts of a few pages. Others are works extending through several volumes.  His 14-volume The Canon of Medicine (Al-Qanoon fi al-Tibb, The Laws of Medicine) was a standard medical text in Europe and the Islamic world until the 17th century).

Among Avicenna’s first works translated by various schools of translators were the principal parts of his most detailed and longest philosophical treaties Kitab as-Shifa’. Several parts of Avicenna’s major philosophical encyclopedia as-Shifa’ were translated into Latin, mainly in Toledo at the end of the twelfth century and in Burgos at the end of the thirteenth century.
Avicenna 

Measles in history

Measles probably began with the start of urban life in the Middle East around 3000 BC.

Some historians believe that a plague that killed a large part of the Athenian army in 430 to 429 BC was measles. As urbanization occurred in subsequent centuries, the proximity or larger populations nurtured epidemics with continued circulation of virus in cities. There were massive epidemics in the Roman Empire starting in 165 and in 251 AD, and two similar epidemics in China in 162 and 310.

Jews physician such as Al Yehudi had recognized the illness but without distinction between it and other rash disordered.

Measles was first documented by an Arabic physician called Rhazes.

Rhazes lived in the 10th century but he quoted other authors on measles form as far back s Al Yehudi, who lived in the 7th century.

He distinguished between smallpox and measles even though he believed that the two conditions were part of one morbid process.

Rhazes referred it the disease as widespread throughout the East and the same opinion is expressed by Avicenna and other Arabic writers of the tenth and eleventh centuries.

By the 17th century, some European also physicians had identified the differences between measles and small pox.

In 1846, a Danish physician Peter Panum studied a measles outbreak on the Faroe Islands and was the first to describe the clinical presentation, incubation and infectious nature of measles.

The introduction of measles vaccine in 1963 and its subsequent widespread use led to dramatic declines in the reported incidence of measles.
Measles in history