Arabic Pharmacy during the Age of the Caliphs

At around the 10th century, the Abbasids, began producing paper, an art learned from their Chinese prisoners. They established a paper mill in Baghdad, and the use of paper spread throughout the Middle East, North Africa and eventually into Europe. By this time, an advanced scientific approach to medicine, encouraged by the Prophet Muhammad, had already been well established in the Abbasid caliphate. Paper made books more affordable, and the desire for scientific knowledge urged the translation of medical texts from Greek, Latin, ancient Egyptian, Chinese and other languages into Arabic. The Western approach to medicine can be traced, in part, to this enlightened period and culture. (c) 2002 Prous Science. All rights reserved.