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Inventions by Muslims - An awareness
- Coffee: The story goes that an Arab named Khalid was tending his goats in the Kaffa region of southern Ethiopia, when he noticed his animals became livelier after eating a certain berry. He boiled the berries to make the first coffee. Certainly the first record of the drink is of beans exported from Ethiopia to Yemen where Sufis (Holy saints) drank it to stay awake all night to pray on special occasions. By the late 15th century it had arrived in Mecca and Turkey from where it made its way to Venice in 1645. It was brought to England in 1650 by a Turk named Pasqua Rosee who opened te first coffee house in Lombard street in the city of London. The Arabic qahwa became the Turkish kahve then the Italian caffe and then English coffee.
- Windmill: The windmill was invented in 634 for a Persian caliph and was used to grind corn and draw up water for irrigation. In the vast deserts of Arabia. When the seasonal streams ran dry, the only source of power was the wind which blew steadily from one direction for months. Mills had had six or 12 sails covered in fabric or palm leaves . it was 500 years before the first windmill was seen in Europe.
- Chess: A form of chess was played in ancient India but the game was developed into the form we know it today in Persia. From there it spread westward to Europe - where it was introduced by the moors in Spain in the 10th century and eastward as far as Japan. The word rook comes from the Persian rukh, which means chariot.
- Parachute: A thousand year before the wright brothers a muslim poet, astronomer, musician and engineer, named Abbas ibn Firnas made several attempts to construct a flying machine. In 852 he jumped from the minaret of the grand mosque in cordoba using a loose cloak stiffened with wooden struts. He hoped to glide like a bird. He didn’t. But the cloak slowed his fall, creating what is thought to be the first parachute and leaving him with only minor injuries. In 875, aged 70 having perfected a machine of silk and eagles feathers he tried again, jumping from a mountain. He flew to significant height and stayed aloft for ten minutes but crashed on landing concluding, correctly, that it was because he had not given his device a tail so it would stall on landing. Baghdad international airport and a crater on the Moon are named after him.
- Fountain Pen: The fountain pen was invented for the sultan of Egypt in 953 after he demanded a pen which would not stain his hands or clothes. If held ink in a reservoir and as with modern pens, fed ink to the nib by a combination of gravity and capillary action.
- Shampoo: Washing and bathing are religious requirements for Muslims, which is perhaps why they perfected recipe for soap which we still use today. The ancient Egyptians had soap of a kind as did the Romans who used it more as pomade. But it was the Arabs who combined vegetable oils with sodium hydroxide and aromatics such as thyme oil. One of the crusader’s more striking characteristics, to Arab nostrils, was that they did not wash. Shampoo was introduced to England by a Muslim who opened Mahomed’s Indian vapour Baths on Brighton seafront in 1759 and was appointed Shampooing surgeon to Kings George IV and William IV.
- Pay Cheques: The modern cheque comes from the Arabic Saqq, a written vow to pay for goods when they were delivered, to avoid money having to be transported across dangerous dangerous terrain. In the 9th century, a Muslim businessman could cash a cheque in China drawn on his bank in Baghdad.
to be Continued....
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