Du latin à l’arabe

Résumé 0

During the seventeenth century, an attempt was made in the East, particularly by the Syrian physician Ibn Sallum (d. 1081/1670), to introduce what was known in Europe, a century before, as the “New Medicine” an expression designated the medico-chemical doctrine of Paracelsus (ca. 1493-1541) and his followers. Ibn Sallum’s treatise Ghayat al-itqan fi tadbir badan al-insan is essentially a compilation of different writings of Paracelsus and his school. The fourth section, of this medical encyclopaedia of Ibn Sallum, is entitled “The new chemical medicine invented by Paracelsus”. Sometimes the second part of Oswald Crollius’ (1560-1609) Basilica Chymica is appended to this fourth section. Ibn Sallum’s work, besides its intrinsic value for the history of medicine in the East in general and the history of Paracelsianism in particular, is very important for the history of Arabic medical vocabulary and terminology derived, not from Greek, Persian, Syriac and Sanskrit, as it is usually the case, but from Latin. Here we are concerned with the study and analysis of only the fourth section of Ibn Sallum’s treatise and the appendix which contains the Arabic abridged translation of the second part of Crollius’ work.