Moors - Notable Moors

Notable Moors

See also: List of Berbers and List of Arab scientists and scholars

• Tariq ibn Ziyad, Moorish general who defeated the Visigoths and conquered Hispania in 711.
• Abd ar-Rahman I, founder of the Umayyad Emirate of Córdoba in 756; along with its succeeding Caliphate of Córdoba, the dynasty ruled Islamic Spain for three centuries.
• Ibn al-Qūṭiyya, Andalusian historian and grammarian.
• Yahya al-Laithi, Andalusian scholar who introduced the Maliki school of jurisprudence in Al-Andalus.
• Abbas Ibn Firnas, 810–887, Berber inventor and aviator who invented an early parachute and made the first attempt at controlled flight with a hang glider.
• Maslamah Ibn Ahmad al-Majriti, died 1007, Andalusian writer believed to have been the author of the Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity and the Picatrix.
• Abu al-Qasim al-Zahrawi (Abulcasis), Andalusian physician and surgeon who established the discipline of surgery as a profession with his Al-Tasrif in 1000.
• Said Al-Andalusi, 1029–1070, Andalusian Qadi, historian, philosopher, mathematician and astronomer.
• Abū Ishāq Ibrāhīm al-Zarqālī (Arzachel), 1029–1087, Andalusian astronomer and engineer who developed the equatorium and universal (latitude-independent) astrolabe and compiled a Zij later used as a basis for the Tables of Toledo.
• Artephius, circa 1126, Andalusian scientist known as the author of numerous works of Alchemical texts, now extant only in Latin.
• Ibn Bajjah (Avempace), died 1138, Andalusian physicist and polymath whose theory of motion, including the concept of a reaction force, influenced the development of classical mechanics.
• Ibn Zuhr (Avenzoar), 1091–1161, Andalusian physician and polymath who discovered the existence of parasites and pioneered experimental surgery.
• Muhammad al-Idrisi, circa 1100–1166, Moorish geographer and polymath who drew the Tabula Rogeriana, the most accurate world map in pre-modern times.
• Ibn Tufail, circa 1105–1185, Arabic writer and polymath who wrote Hayy ibn Yaqdhan, the first philosophical novel.
• Averroes (Ibn Rushd), 1126–1198, classical Islamic philosopher and polymath who wrote The Incoherence of the Incoherence and the most extensive Aristotelian commentaries, and established the school of Averroism.
• Ibn al-Baitar, died 1248, Andalusian botanist and pharmacist who compiled the most extensive pharmacopoeia and botanical compilation in pre-modern times.
• Ibn Khaldun, a pioneer of the social sciences and forerunner of sociology, historiography and economics, who wrote the Muqaddimah in 1377.
• Abū al-Hasan ibn Alī al-Qalasādī, 1412–1486, Moorish mathematician who took the first steps toward the introduction of algebraic symbolism.
• Leo Africanus, 1494–1554, Andalusian geographer, author and diplomat, who was captured by Spanish pirates and sold as a slave, but later baptized and freed.
• Estevanico, also referred to as "Stephen the Moor", was an explorer in the service of Spain of what is now the southwest of the United States.