Lost Enlightenment
：Central Asia's Golden Age from the Arab Conquest to Tamerlane
Publication subTitle ：Central Asia's Golden Age from the Arab Conquest to Tamerlane
Author： Starr S.
Publisher： Princeton University Press
Publication year： 2013
E-ISBN: 9781400848805
P-ISBN(Paperback): 9780691157733
Subject： K36 Central Asia
Keyword： 自然科学史,宗教史、宗教地理,世界哲学,世界史,亚洲史
Language： ENG
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Description
In this sweeping and richly illustrated history, S. Frederick Starr tells the fascinating but largely unknown story of Central Asia's medieval enlightenment through the eventful lives and astonishing accomplishments of its greatest minds--remarkable figures who built a bridge to the modern world. Because nearly all of these figures wrote in Arabic, they were long assumed to have been Arabs. In fact, they were from Central Asia--drawn from the Persianate and Turkic peoples of a region that today extends from Kazakhstan southward through Afghanistan, and from the easternmost province of Iran through Xinjiang, China.
Lost Enlightenment recounts how, between the years 800 and 1200, Central Asia led the world in trade and economic development, the size and sophistication of its cities, the refinement of its arts, and, above all, in the advancement of knowledge in many fields. Central Asians achieved signal breakthroughs in astronomy, mathematics, geology, medicine, chemistry, music, social science, philosophy, and theology, among other subjects. They gave algebra its name, calculated the earth's diameter with unprecedented precision, wrote the books that later defined European medicine, and penned some of the world's greatest poetry. One scholar, working in Afghanistan, even predicted the existence of North and South America--five centuries before Columbus. Rarely in history has a more impressive group of polymaths appeared at one place and time. No wonde
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