Abu Ma'sar on Historical Astrology: The Book of Religions and Dynasties (On the Great Conjunctions).

• Author: van Bladel, Kevin T.
• Position: Reviews of Books - Book Review

Abu Ma'sar on Historical Astrology: The Book of Religions and Dynasties (On the Great Conjunctions). Edited and translated by KEJJI YAMAMOTO and CHARLES BURNETT. 2 vols.: vol. 1, The Arabic Original; vol. 2, The Latin Versions, Leiden: BRILL, 2000. Pp. xxvii + 620; xxxiii + 578. $362.

These two large volumes are an important contribution to the study of the history of astrology and of medieval sciences. The main part of the first volume is a critical edition of the Arabic Kitab al-Milal wa-d-duwal (The Book of Religions and Dynasties) of Abu ma'sar al-Balhi (d. 886) with a facing English translation. In the second volume we are given a critical edition of the Latin translation of this text, made probably in Toledo around the 1130s. Abu Ma'sar, who flourished as an author in Baghdad, is considered the most important astrologer after Ptolemy. His works in general, containing a synthesis of Greek, Sasanian, and Indian astrological doctrines and methods typical of the early 'Abbasid period, became standard authorities in Asia and in Europe.

If the Arabic and Latin editions were all that these two volumes contributed, they would be very valuable. However, they are made indispensable references for the student of historical astrology by the accompanying explanatory introductions to the subject. Also included are valuable Arabic and Latin editions of several short texts by other authors (including al-Kindi, Masa'allah, Ibn Abi r-Rijal, Kanka al-Hindi) pertinent to the history of Abu Ma'sar's text and its doctrines. These short texts especially should not go unnoticed in a work bearing only the name Abu Ma'sar.

The first volume begins with a brief introduction to Abu Ma'sar's life and works and the subject of historical astrology, a survey of the Arabic manuscripts and a stemma codicum. The Arabic edition showing variant readings in footnotes with facing English translations fills altogether 511 pages. The editor has identified two recensions of the text, a western and an eastern, and has presented the western recension.

Note that the mysterious name on line 209 of the Arabic edition (vol. 1, p. 23) is to be read 'nynws, that is Annianus (an early fourth-century Egyptian Christian monk whose world chronicle or list of dates is now lost). Cf. the same citation in al-Biruni, al-Athar al-baqiya, ed. Sachau, 21. 19 (lacking the words wa-sahr) and in Barhebraeus, Ta'rih muhtasar ad-duwal, ed. Salihani, 15.16-19.

There are five appendices to the Arabic...