Enzyklopädie als Spiegel des Weltbildes (Diskurse der Arabistik 4). Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz Verlag, 2002, 398 p.

Abstract

The book deals with the 13th century encyclopaedia of natural history ⁽Ajā’ib al-maḫlūqāt wa ġarā’ib al-mawjūdāt by Zakariyā’ al-Qazwīnī. The analysis intends to define the place of Qazwīnī’s work and the concept of the created world it presents within the framework of the intellectual history of Muslim culture (p. 15). This is done, first, by trying to establish a biography of Qazwīnī, including his birth date (1202), mainly based upon material found in works by Ibn Fuwatī and in Qazwīnī’s ...