ISLAMIC CONTRIBUTIONS IN SCIENCE

Explosive Gunpowder and the First Cannon

The first use of explosive gunpowder and cannon is another critical issue in the history of civilization. Gunpowder was first known in China but the mixture used was weak and not explosive. The proportions of the ingredients were not the right ones for cannon and the purity of the nitrate was not adequate because of the lack of a purification process. 

In the thirteenth century the military engineer Hasan al-Rammah (d 1295 AD) described in his book al-furusiyya wa al-manasib al-harbiyya (The Book of Military Horsemanship and Ingenious War Devices) the first process for the purification of potassium nitrate. 

The process involves the lixiviation of the earths containing the nitrate in water, adding wood ashes and crystallization. Wood ashes are potassium carbonates which act on calcium nitrate which usually accompany potassium nitrate to produce potassium nitrate and calcium carbonate. The carbonates are not soluble and are precipitated. 

Two illustrations from an Arabic military treatise (known as the Petersburg manuscript) showing the first use of explosive gunpowder and cannon.

Al-Rammah deals extensively in his book with explosive gunpowder and its uses. The estimated date of writing this book is between 1270 and 1280. The front page states that the book was written as "instructions by the eminent master Najm al-Din Hasan Al-Rammah, as handed down to him by his father and his forefathers the masters in this art and by those contemporary elders and masters who befriended them, may God be pleased with them all". It is unmistakable from this statement that Al-Rammah compiled inherited knowledge. The large number of gunpowder recipes and the extensive types of weaponry using gunpowder indicate that this information cannot be the invention of a single person, and this supports the statement of the front piece in his book. If we go back only to his grandfather's generation, as the first of his forefathers, then we end up at the end of the twelfth century or the beginning of the thirteenth as the date when explosive gunpowder became prevalent in Syria and Egypt. 

The book contains 107 recipes for gunpowder. There are 22 recipes for rockets (tayyarat, sing, tayyar). Among the remaining compositions some are for military uses and some are for fireworks. The gunpowder composition of seventeen rockets was analyzed, and it was found that the median value for potassium nitrates is 75 percent.

The ideal composition for explosive gunpowder as reported by modern historians of gunpowder is 75 percent potassium nitrate, 10 percent sulphur, and 15 percent carbon. Al-Rammah's median composition is 75 nitrates, 9.06 sulphur and 15.94 carbon which is almost identical with the reported ideal recipe. 

Analysis of the composition of explosive gunpowder in several other Arabic military treatises of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries gave results similar to those of al-Rammah. These included the composition of gunpowder in the first cannon in history that was used, according to the military treatises, to frighten the Tatar armies in the battle of ‘Ayn Jalut in 1260. 

The correct formula for the explosive mixture was not known in China or Europe until much later.

The Arabs in al-Andalus used cannon in their conflicts with the crusading armies in Spain and their first knowledge of the art was effective in their encounters. But ultimately the Muslim technology of gunpowder and cannon was transferred to Christian Spain and was used by them it the last encounters with the Muslims. From Christian Spain this technology reached Western Europe. We have mentioned in Part I of this article how the Earls of Derby and Salisbury, who participated in the siege of al-Jazira (1342-1344), took back with them the secrets of gunpowder and cannon to England.

Perfumes and Rosewater

A distillation plant in Damascus consisting of multiple units
for producing rose water (13^th century ms)

According to some historians of perfumes, the Arabs became for several centuries the perfumers of the world.[5] It is reported that among the many presents of Harun al-Rashid to Charlemagne were several types of perfumes. Forbes, the historian of technology, says that only with the coming of the golden age of Arab culture was a technique developed for the distillation of essential oils. By distilling their favourite flower, the rose, the Arabs succeeded in extracting from it a perfume that is still a favourite all over the world - rose water. Rose water came to Europe at the time of the Crusades. 

Damascus was famous for its rose-water. We have detailed descriptions in the literature of rose-water distillation installations in Damascus. It was exported to several countries including Europe. 

According to Arab geographers, rose water was distilled also in Jur, and in other towns in Fars. The rosewater of Jur was the best quality and it was exported to all countries of the world including: the Rum (Byzantium), Rumia (Rome) and the lands of Firanja (France and Western Europe), India and China.

Sugar

Sugar is a basic commodity that owes most of its development and spread to the Islamic civilization. It is thought that sugar-cane originated in eastern Asia from where it spread to India and then to Persia before Islam. 

When Islam came to Persia in 642 AD sugar-cane was being grown and unrefined sugar was known. With the rise of the Arab-Muslim Empire sugar-cane spread into all the Islamic Mediterranean lands including Sicily and Spain and sugar production became a large scale industry. 

Sugar refining was developed greatly and several qualities of sugar were produced and exported. Sugar became a foodstuff as well as a medicinal material in all Muslim countries and then in Europe. 

This illustration of sugar cane is from an Arabic manuscript on natural history.

Sugar was first known to western Europeans as a result of the Crusades in the 11^th century AD. Crusaders returning home talked of this "new spice" and how pleasant it was. The first sugar was recorded in England in 1099. It became a luxury commodity in high demand. It is recorded, for instance, that sugar was available in London at "two shillings a pound" in 1319 AD. This equates to about US$100 per kilogram at today's prices.

Pegolotti in his lists of goods imported into Italy between 1310 and 1340 wrote that these included powdered sugar of Alexandria, Cairo, Kerak, Syria and Cyprus. Also lump sugar, basket sugar, rock candy, rose sugar, and violet sugar from Cairo and Damascus. England was importing its sugar from Morocco as well. We may remember that the words sugar and candy are both of Arabic origin. 

From Spain sugar-cane plantations were established in the 1400's in Madeira, the Canary Islands, and St. Thomas. The Islamic technology of sugar-cane processing and sugar refining were established there. 

In 1493 Columbus carried sugar cane cuts from the Canaries to Santa Domingo, and by the mid 1500's its manufacture had spread over the greater part of tropical America.

Ulasan..

pelbagai sumbangan yang telah disumbangkan oleh ahli sainstis Islam kedalam sains dan teknologi diantaranya ialah gunpower iaitu bahan letupan yang digunakan didalam setiap senjata. gunpower ini juga dipanggil dengan ubat bedil yang dimasukkan kedalam meriam, proses ini menggunakan pembuatan secara bahan kimia iaitu dengan melibatkan lixiviation bumi-bumi yang mengandungi nitrat dalam air, sambil menambah abu kayu dan penghabluran. Abu kayu adalah karbonat kalium yang bertindak ke atas nitrat kalsium yang biasanya mengiringi kalium nitrat untuk menghasilkan kalium nitrat dan kalsium karbonat. Karbonat tidak larut dan dicetuskan.

selain daripada sumbangan dari segi kimia, sainstis Islam juga melakukan pembuatan air mawar yang menggunakan sumber-sumber yang berkaitan, air mawar juga dipanggil dengan minyak wangi yang menghasilkan bau wangi yang amat luar biasa. minyak wangi ini terkenal hampir keseluruh dunia dan dalam masa yang sama ia juga menjadi salah satu bahan untuk perdagangan dan tamadun Islam.

sumbangan yang terakhir ialah membuat gula, gula dihasilkan daripada tebu, dan pokok tebu didapati daripada India, gula juga banyak digunakan dalam kehidupan seharian. pemprosesan tebu menjadi gula dilakukan sejak zaman kebangkitan Islam dengan menggunakan mesin yang telah dicipta dan dalam masa yang sama ini menambahkan lagi sumbangan dalam sains dan teknologi dalam tamadun Islam. sumbangan - sumbangan yang diberikan oleh sainstis Islam telah berkembang ke seluruh dunia.