Mathematician:Gerard of Cremona

Mathematician

Italian scholar whose calling was to translate Arabic scientific and mathematical papers into Latin, many of which themselves were translations of works originally written in Greek.

Some sources credit him for the mistranslation that led to the word sine, but this may be more reliably attributed to Robert of Chester, who appears to be earlier.

Nationality

Italian

History

• Born: 1114 in Cremona, Italy
• Died: 1187 in Toledo, Spain

Translations

• Claudius Ptolemy's Almagest
• Archimedes' On the Measurement of the Circle
• Aristotle's On the Heavens
• Euclid's The Elements

• On Algebra and Almucabala, from Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi's Al-Kitāb al-muḫtaṣar fī ḥisāb al-ğabr wa-l-muqābala
• Jabir ibn Aflah's Elementa Astronomica

Also known as

His name is sometimes rendered Gherard or Gerhard.

Sources

• John J. O'Connor and Edmund F. Robertson: "Gerard of Cremona": MacTutor History of Mathematics archive