LITERATURE OF THE ARABS. 77 



tion, and the desire to leave no subject untouclied, 

 that Ibn Zaid of Cordova, and Abul Mondar of 

 Valencia, wrote a Genealogical History of celebrated 

 Horses ; as did Alasueco and Abdolmalec that of 

 Camels which had risen to distinction. This last- 

 mentioned author and eminent antiquary rendered 

 to his countrymen the same literary service that 

 Bayle and Moreri conferred on Europeans, by giv- 

 ing them a copious historical dictionary. The Arabs 

 possessed encyclopaedias, gazetteers, and other simi- 

 lar compilations on critical and biographical sub- 

 jects. They were familiar, in short, with all those 

 inventions which curtail labour, dispense with the 

 necessity of research, and afford facilities to indo- 

 lence or curiosity. The Dictionary of the Sciences, 

 by Mohammed Abu Abdallah of Granada, was an 

 elaborate work, consisting of eleven parts, of which 

 a fragment of the seventh and the four last are still 

 extant. A similar compilation was made by the 

 renowned Farabi, who spoke seventy-two languages, 

 and wrote on every science then known. 



With numismatics the Saracens were well ac- 

 quainted. Namari and Makrizi wrote histories of 

 Arabian money ; the latter also produced a treatise 

 on the legal weights and measures. Azaker wrote 

 commentaries on the first inventors of the arts ; and 

 Gazali, in his learned work on Arabian antiquities, 

 treated in a profound manner of the studies and dis- 

 coveries of his countrymen. 



Of geography they had, so far as their limited 

 means went, a tolerably accurate knowledge. The 

 library at Cairo could boast of two massive globes, 

 one of which was of brass, the other of pure silver, 

 constructed by an Arabian cosmogi-apher, which 

 weighed 3000 drachms, and is said to have cost as 

 many thousand crowns of gold. In this department 

 Abulfeda holds a conspicuous rank. The Sheriff 

 Edrisi of Cordova, who made the celebrated silver 

 globe for Roger H., king of Sicily, is justly distin- 



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