Al-Hasan b. Ali al-Qummi

Al-Hasan b. Ali al-Qummi

Personal Information
Death	after 366/976-7
Scholarly Information
Works	Al-mudkhil ila ilm ahkam al-nujum

Abu Naṣr, al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī al-Qummī (Arabic: ابونصر، الحسن بن علي القمي) (d. after 366/976-7) was a Shi'a Persian astronomer.

Life

Some have noted his name as "Nasr b. al-Hasan". He served Fakhr al-Dawla al-Daylami for some time and had predicted his reign through astrology. Assuming his prediction to have been after the death of Rukn al-Dawla (366/976-7), during the conflicts and fights between his sons, and by the time Fakhr al-Dawla has been most anxious about his future, it is quite imaginable then, that Abu Nasr has lived for some years later. H. Suter suggests the possibility of his being alive until around 390/999-1000.

Considering his religion, it is stipulated that he has been a Shi'a.

Writings

Al-Mudkhil ila 'ilm ahkam al-nujum

Also known as al-Bari' ila ahkam al-nujum (al-tawami') is an Arabic book about the basics of astrology, according to Paris manuscript which was written for Fakhr al-Dawla, while according to the Bodleian Library manuscript, it was written for Shaykh Abu 'Amr b. Sa'id b. Marzban. Haji Khalifa has dated the writing of the book in 357/967-8, and his contemporaries have all restated it. At the end of Tabriz manuscript though, the book is dated in 366/976-7, assuming the latter date to be true, it is more likely that the book was written for Fakhr al-Dawla.

Content

The book contains 64 chapters, the content of which is same as other astrology books, though in brief, and does not enjoy a high scientific value. But there are still some remarkable notes, such as those of chapter 10 from the forth article about "intiha'at", narrating from the book Zij shah (which was written in Sassanid era).

Manuscripts

Several manuscripts of the book are extant today;

• The manuscript of Tabriz National Library, scripted in 740/1339-40, which is the source of this article.
• The manuscript of Paris National Library, scripted in 704/1304-5.
• The manuscript of Bodleian Library and the manuscript of Berlin, all headlines of which are included in the list of contents of Berlin Library.

Al-Mudkhil is also translated into Persian, and there is a Persian manuscript of the book, scripted in 806/1403-4, in Berlin Library (Ahlwardt, No. 5663), though Aqa Buzurg Tihrani believes that this manuscript is incomplete. An Arabic summarization of the book, titled Mukhtasar al-bari' fi l-falak wa l-tawami' , is also available (Ahlwardt, No. 5662).

Tarikh khulafa (The History of Caliphs)

The author of Tarikh Qom has mentioned a book written by Abu Nasr about the history of caliphs and their traditions and festivals, and has narrated a part of it through the book al-'Abbasi , by Ahmad b. Isma'il al-Bajali known as Samaka. Together as they have been in the court of Fakhr al-Dawla for some time, the indirect narration of the author of Tarikh Qom from the book of Abu Nasr is a little strange. Nevertheless, it suggests that Abu Nasr enjoyed a scientific fame, long before he came to serve Fakhr al-Dawla.

This book is not available today.