Alberuni

(973–ca.1050 C.E.) Anglicized version
of the name of Abu Rayhan Biruni, a
central Asian scholar-scientist who
was one of the greatest intellectual figures of his time. Alberuni was a member of the court of King Mahmud of
Ghazni—by most accounts, quite
reluctantly—and was forced to accompany Mahmud on some of his pillaging raids in India. Alberuni used this
involuntary “fieldwork” as an opportunity to study Hindu life, culture, and
sciences, and his work shows him to
be a perceptive, careful, and dispassionate observer. In 1030 C.E. he published his findings in his Tahqiq ma
li’l-Hind, which was translated in 1888
by Edward Sachau as Alberuni’s India.
An abridged edition edited by Ainslee
Embree was published in 1971.