About uzbekistan contents: History of my country

Famous people in Uzbekistan

Abu Ali al - Husain ibn Abdallah ibn Sina (Avicenna). Born: 980 in Kharmaithen (near Bukhara), Central Asia (now Uzbekistan). Died: June 1037 in Hamadan, Persia (now Iran). Ibn Sina or Avicenna was the most influential of all Islamic philosopher - scientists. He wrote on medicine as well as geometry, astronomy, arithmetic and music. Ibn Sina's two most important works are The Book of Healing and The Canon of Medicine. The first is a scientific encyclopaedia covering logic, natural sciences, psychology, geometry, astronomy, arithmetic and music. The second is the most famous single book in the history of medicine. Ibn Sina wrote about 450 works, of which around 240 have survived. Of the surviving works, 150 are on philosophy while 40 are devoted to medicine, the two fields in which he contributed most. He also wrote on psychology, geology, mathematics, astronomy, and logic. His most important work as far as mathematics is concerned, however, is his immense encyclopaedic work, the Kitab al - Shifa (The Book of Healing). One of the four parts of this work is devoted to mathematics and ibn Sina includes astronomy and music as branches of mathematics within the encyclopaedia. In fact he divided mathematics into four branches, geometry, astronomy, arithmetic, and music, and he then subdivided each of these topics. Geometry he subdivided into geodesy, statics, kinematics, hydrostatics, and optics; astronomy he subdivided into astronomical and geographical tables, and the calendar; arithmetic he subdivided into algebra, and Indian addition and subtraction; music he subdivided into musical instruments.
	Ulugbeg

Perhaps the heavens determined his inquiring nature by birthing Mohammed Taragai on March 22, 1394, during the vernal equinox. Tamerlane soon recognized his grandson's talents, for he named him Ulugbeg, 'grand duke', and took him on campaigns to the Caucasus and India. In 1404 Spanish ambassador Clavijo attended the ten-year-old's wedding feast; five years later, his father Shakhrukh made him viceroy of Samarkand, lord of Transoxiana, while he ruled Persia from Herat. The young man's love of mathematics, history, theology, medicine, poetry and music gave the city a reputation for learning and culture that drew the Turkish astronomer Qazi Zadeh Rumi. Under this tutor Ulugbeg found his favorite science.
From 424 to 1429 he ordered the construction of an observatory without equal in East or West, on a scale to ensure unprecedented accuracy and make Samarkand the stargazing capital of the 15^th century. With a circle of experts Ulugbeg plotted the coordinates of 1018 stars (the first such undertaking since Ptolemy), devised rules for predicting eclipses and measured the stellar year to within one minute of modem electronic calculations. Ever alert for flatter/, he accepted no observations until honest debate secured agreement. His memory was exceptional - when a librarian his hunting logbook lost, Ulugbeg instantly dictated the full list of kills, almost to perfection, as the logbook proved when rediscovered.
Like Galileo two centuries later, he challenged religious orthodoxy with statements of bold secularism, even heresy: "Religious dissipate like fog, kingdoms vanish, but the works of scientists remain for eternity." Shakhrukh ruled Herat as an ideal Muslim monarch, devout and strong whereas his son's court reveled in the feasting, song and dance of Tamerlane's day. UlugBeg was supported by the official clergy and built various madrasahs and mosques, but he failed to diffuse the growing hostility and power of Sufis dervishes. On his father's death in 1447 events simply overtook the new head of the troubled Timurid realm, exposing him as lettered scholar, not decisive ruler.
Blame:! for the unruly behavior of his son Abdulaziz and defeated several times in battle, Ulugbeg was seized in October 1449 by his other son, Abd al-Latif. A secret court of dervishes dispatched him on a redeeming pilgrimage to Mecca. He had only reached a village outside Samarkand when he was beheaded with Abd al-Latif's connivance. The observatory was raised to the ground as the "cemetery of forty evil spirits", yet just six months later the severed head of the parricide was displayed on his father's madrasah.
Ulugbeg's fellow scientist Ali Kushji fled to Constantinople, where the martyred ruler's star atlas was published to great acclaim throughout the Muslim world. Although these tables became known in Europe only in the rnid-17th century, superseded by Tycho Brahe's discoveries around 1600, the observatory was still being imitated in India in the 18^th century. In 1994, Uzbekistan proudly celebrated the 600^я1 anniversary of the birth of Mirza (learned) Ulugbeg by restoring the beautiful buildings that survive him.