Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: al-Mutawakkil

  • Hunayn ibn Ishaq, Baghdad physician and polymath

    Hunayn ibn Ishaq (809–873), the “sheik of the translators,” was an influential Christian translator, scholar, physician, and scientist who lived in Baghdad at the height of the Abbasid civilization. He was very learned and spoke four languages: Arabic, Syriac, Greek, and Persian. Traveling to the Greek Byzantine Empire in search of manuscripts, he translated works…