Taqi ad-Din Muhammad ibn Ma'ruf ash-Shami al-Asadi (; ; 1526–1585) was an Ottoman polymath active in Cairo and Constantinople. He was the author of more than ninety books on a wide variety of subjects, including astronomy, clocks, engineering, mathematics, mechanics, optics, and natural philosophy.
In 1574 the Ottoman Sultan Murad III invited Taqi ad-Din to build an observatory in the Ottoman capital, Constantinople. Taqi ad-Din constructed instruments such as an armillary sphere and mechanical clocks that he used to observe the Great Comet of 1577. He also used European celestial and terrestrial globes that were delivered to Constantinople in gift exchanges.
His major work from the use of his observatory is titled "The tree of ultimate knowledge [in the end of time or the world] in the Kingdom of the Revolving Spheres: The astronomical tables of the King of Kings [Murad III]" (Sidrat al-muntah al-afkar fi malkūt al-falak al-dawār– al-zij al-Shāhinshāhi). The work was prepared according to the results of the observations carried out in Egypt and Constantinople in order to correct and complete Ulugh Beg's 15th century work, the Zij-i Sultani. The first 40 pages of the work dealt with calculations, followed by discussions of astronomical clocks, heavenly circles, and information on three eclipses which he observed in Cairo and Istanbul.
As a polymath, Taqi al-Din wrote numerous books on astronomy, mathematics, mechanics, and theology. His method of finding coordinates of stars were reportedly so precise that he got better measurements than his contemporaries, Tycho Brahe and Nicolas Copernicus. Brahe is also thought to have been aware of Taqi al-Din's work.Ágoston, Gábor; Masters, Bruce Alan. Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire Infobase Publishing, 2009. p. 552
Taqi ad-Din also described a steam turbine with the practical application of rotating a spit in 1551. He worked on and created astronomical clocks for his observatory. Taqi ad-Din also wrote a book on optics, in which he determined the light emitted from objects, proved the Law of Reflection observationally, and worked on refraction.
Biography
Taqī al-Dīn was born in Damascus in 1526 according to most sources. His ethnicity has been described as Arab, "Two such cases are Piri Reis (d.1554), an Ottoman Turk from Gallipoli, and Taqi al-Din (d.1585), an Ottoman Arab from Damascus. They form the symbolic pivot of my argument." Kurdish, Syrian,Ibn Haytham, Nader el-Bizri, Medieval Science Technology and Medicine: An Encyclopedia, ed. Thomas F. Glick, Steven Livesey, Faith Wallis, (Taylor & Francis Group, 2005), 239;"..composed as a commentary on Kamal al-Din's "Tanqih" by Taqi al-Din Muhammad ibn Ma'ruf, the Syrian astronomer at the Ottoman court". and Turkish." Chief Astronomer Taqi al-Din was born to a family of Turkish descent in Damascus." Hoffmann, Dieter; İhsanoğlu, Ekmeleddin; Djebbar, Ahmed; Günergun, Feza. Science, technology, and industry in the Ottoman world in Volume 6 of Proceedings of the XXth International Congress of History of Science p. 19. Publisher Brepols, 2000. In his treatise, titled "Rayḥānat al-rūḥ", Taqī al-Dīn himself claimed descent from the Ayyubids Taqi ad-Din lineage as recorded by himself in his Rayḥānat al-rūḥ: "تقي الدين محمد بن معروف بن أحمد بن محمد بن محمد بن أحمد بن يوسف ابن الأمير ناصر الدين منكويرس ابن الأمير ناصح الدين خمارتكين" "Taqi al-Din Muhammad ibn Ma'ruf ibn Ahmed ibn Muhammad ibn Muhammad ibn Ahmed ibn Yusuf ibn Nasir al-Din Mankarus ibn Nasih al-Din Khumartekin" tracing his lineage back to the Ayyubid prince Nasir al-Din Mankarus ibn Nasih al-Din Khumartekin who ruled Abu Qubays in Syria during the 12th century.Lyons, Malcolm Cameron; Jackson, D. E. P. (1984). Saladin: The Politics of the Holy War. Cambridge University Press. p. 195. The Encyclopaedia of Islam makes no mention of his ethnicity, simply calling him, "...the most important astronomer of Ottoman Turkey".
Taqi ad-Din's education started in theology and as he went on he would gain an interest in the rational sciences. Following his interest, he would begin to study the rational sciences in Damascus and Cairo. During that time he studied alongside his father Maʿruf Efendi. Al-Dīn went on to teach at various madaris and served as a qadi, or judge, in Palestine, Damascus, and Cairo. He stayed in Egypt and Damascus for some time and while he was there he created work in astronomy and mathematics. His work in these categories would eventually become important. He became a chief astronomer to the Sultan in 1571 a year after he came to Istanbul, replacing Mustafa ibn Ali al-Muwaqqit.
Taqī al-Dīn maintained a strong bond with the people from the Ulama and statesmen. He would pass on information to Sultan Murad III who had an interest in astronomy but also in astrology. The information stated that Ulugh Beg Zij had particular observational errors. Al-Dīn made a suggestions that those errors could be fixed if there were new observations made. He also suggested that an observatory should be created in Constantinople to make that situation easier. Murad III would become a patron of the first observatory in Constantinople. He preferred that construction for the new observatory begin immediately. Since Murad III was the patron he would assist with finances for the project.
Taqī al-Dīn continued his studies at the Galata Tower while this was going on. His studies would continue until 1577 at the nearly complete observatory, which was called Dar al-Rasad al-Jadid. This new observatory contained a library that held books which covered astronomy and mathematics. The observatory, built in the higher part of Tophane in Istanbul, was made of two separate buildings. One building was big and the other one was small. Al-Dīn possessed some of the instruments used in the old Islamic observatories. He had those instruments reproduced and also created new instruments which would be used for observational purposes. The staff at the new observatory consisted of sixteen people. Eight of them were observers or rasids, four of them were clerks, and the last four were assistants.
Taqī al-Dīn approached his observations in a creative way and created new answers to astronomical problems due to the new strategies he created along with the new equipment he created as well. He would go on to create trigonometric tables based on decimal fractions. These tables placed the ecliptic at 23° 28' 40". The current value was 23° 27' showing that al-Dīn's instruments and methods were more precise. Al-Dīn used a new method to calculate solar parameters and to determine the magnitude of the annual movement of the sun's apogee as 63 seconds. The known value today is 61 seconds. Copernicus came up with 24 seconds and Tycho Brahe had 45 seconds but al-Dīn was more accurate than both.
The main purpose behind the observatory was to cater to the needs of the astronomers and provide a library and workshop so they could design and produce instruments. This observatory would become one of the largest ones in the Islamic world. It was complete in 1579. It would go on to run until January 22, 1580 which is when it was destroyed. Some say religious arguments was the reason why it was destroyed, but it really came down to political problems. A report by the grand vizier Sinan Pasha to Sultan Murad III goes into how the Sultan and the vizier attempted to keep Taqī Ad-Dīn away from the ulama because it seemed like they wanted to take him to trial for heresy. The vizier informs the sultan that Taqī Ad-Dīn wanted to go to Syria regardless of the sultan's orders. The vizier also warned the sultan that if Taqī Ad-Dīn went there, there is a possibility that he would be noticed by the ulama who would take him to trial.
Despite Taqī al-Dīn's originality, his influence seemed to be limited. There are only a small number of surviving copies of his works so they were not able to reach a wide variety of people. His commentaries that are known are very few. However, one of his works and a piece of a library that he owned reached western Europe pretty quickly. This was due to the manuscript collecting efforts of Jacob Golius, a Dutch professor of Arabic and mathematics at Leiden University. Golius traveled to Constantinople in the early seventeenth century. In 1629 he wrote a letter to Constantijn Huygens that talks about seeing Taqī Ad-Dīn's work on optics in Istanbul. He argued that he was not able to get ahold of it from his friends even after all his efforts. He must have succeeded in acquiring it later since Taqī al-Dīn's work on optics would eventually make it to the Bodleian Library as Marsh 119. It was originally in the Golius collection so it is clear that Golius eventually succeeded at acquiring it.
According to Salomon Schweigger, the chaplain of Habsburg ambassador Johann Joachim von Sinzendorf, Taqi al-Din was a charlatan who deceived Sultan Murad III and had him spent enormous resources.Salomon Schweigger, Ein newe Reyssbeschreibung auss Teutschland nach Constantinopel und Jerusalem (Graz, 1964), 90–1.
At the age of 59, after authoring more than ninety books, Taqī al-Dīn died in 1585.
The Constantinople Observatory Taqī al-Dīn was both the founder and director of the Constantinople Observatory, which is also known as the Istanbul Observatory. This observatory is frequently said to be one of Taqī al-Dīn's most important contributions to sixteenth-century Islamic and Ottoman astronomy. In fact, it is known as one of the largest observatories in Islamic history. It is often compared to Tycho Brahe's Uraniborg Observatory, which was said to have been the home to the best instruments of its time in Europe. As a matter of fact, Brahe and Taqī al-Dīn have frequently been compared for their work in sixteenth-century astronomy. The founding of the Constantinople Observatory began when Taqī al-Dīn returned to Constantinople in 1570, after spending 20 years in Egypt developing his astronomy and mathematical knowledge. Shortly after his return, Sultan Selīm II appointed Taqī al-Dīn as the head astronomer (Müneccimbaşı), following the death of the previous head astronomer Muṣṭafā ibn ҁAlī al-Muwaqqit in 1571.
During the early years of his position as head astronomer, Taqī al-Dīn worked in both the Galata Tower and a building overlooking Tophane. While working in these buildings, he began to gain the support and trust of many important Turkish officials. These newfound relationships lead to an imperial edict in 1569 from Sultan Murad III, which called for the construction of the Constantinople Observatory. This observatory became home to many important books and instruments, it had sixteen assistants who helped with the making of scientific instruments, as well as many renowned scholars of the time. While there is not much known of the architectural characteristics of the building, there are many depictions of the scholars and astronomical instruments present in the observatory. It was from this observatory that Taqī al-Dīn discovered the Great Comet of 1577, Murad III taught of the comet as a bad omen on the war with the Safavids (he also blamed Taqī al-Dīn for the plague that was occurring at the time). Due to political conflict, this observatory was short lived. It was closed in 1579 and, was demolished entirely by the state on 22 January 1580, only 11 short years after the imperial edict which called for its construction.
Politics