Toledo School of Translators - Legacy

Legacy

The translations of works on different sciences, such as astronomy, astrology, algebra, medicine, etc. acted as a magnet for numerous scholars from all over Europe who came to Toledo eager to learn first hand about the contents of all those books that had been out of reach to Europeans for many centuries. Thanks to this group of scholars and writers, the knowledge acquired from the Arab, Greek and Hebrew texts found its way into the heart of the universities in Europe. Although the works of Aristotle and Arab philosophers were banned at some European learning centers, such as the University of Paris in the early 1200s, the Toledo's translations were accepted, due to their physical and cosmological nature.

Albertus Magnus based his systematization of Aristotelian philosophy, and much of his writings on astronomy, astrology, mineralogy, chemistry, zoology, physiology, and phrenology upon those translations made in Toledo. His pupil, Thomas Aquinas also used many of the translated work to bring Aristotle into his philosophical and theological treatises.

Roger Bacon relied on many of the Arabic translations to make important contributions in the fields of optics, astronomy, the natural sciences, chemistry and mathematics. Many other scholars of the Renaissance period used the translation of ibn al-Haitham's Kitab al-manazir, which was the most important optical treatise of ancient and medieval times. In general, most disciplines in the field of medicine in Europe greatly benefited from the translations made of works that reflected the advanced state of medicine in medieval Islam and some Asian countries.

Nicolaus Copernicus, the first scientist to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology, which placed the sun instead of the earth at the center of the universe, studied the translation of Ptolemy's astronomical Almagest. He also used the data for astronomical computing contained in the Alfonsine tables, of which he owned a copy after they were published in Venice in 1515. This work was the pioneer in a long list of efforts by European astronomers to attempt the computation of accurate tables of astrological predictions. They became the most popular astronomical tables in Europe and updated versions were regularly produced for three hundred years. Other translated works of astronomical nature, such as Theorica planetarum, were used as an introductory text in astronomy by European students all through the 15th century.

Another side effect of this linguistic enterprise was the promotion of a revised version of the Castilian language that although incorporated a large amount of scientific and technical vocabulary, it had streamlined its syntax in order to be understood by people from all walks of life and to reach the masses, while being made suitable for higher expressions of thought. The contributions of all these scholars, both oral and written, under the tutelage and direction of Alfonso X, established the foundations of the modern supranational Spanish language.