Leon the mathematician

Leon the Mathematician was a major Byzantine scholar , mathematician, and philosopher of the 9th century. He played a not insignificant role in the increased occupation with Greek knowledge in Byzantium in the context of the so-called Macedonian Renaissance .

Leon was born in the last decade of the 8th century and belonged to a well-known Byzantine family. In Constantinople he received rudimentary training in rhetoric , philosophy and arithmetic , but acquired extensive knowledge of classical Greek literature by self -teaching. Above all, geometry , astronomy and astrology seem to have interested him. He initially worked as a private scholar, conveying the knowledge he had gained.

The caliph Al-Ma'mūn became aware of Leon's excellent mathematical knowledge through a student of Leon who was captured by the Arabs . The caliph then offered him a job in Baghdad . Thereupon Emperor Theophilos called him to his court, where Leon was possibly one of the emperor's close advisers in the 830s. In any case, he gave public instructions and supervised the construction of fire alarm stations. In 840 Leon was appointed Archbishop of Thessalonike due to his good political connections , but returned to Constantinople as early as 843, possibly in connection with the end of the iconoclasm . Leon was teaching again until the mid-850s. He then became rector of the newly established college at Magnaura Palace , where geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, grammar and philosophy were taught. It is mentioned in the sources for the last time in 869.

Leon collected astronomical and mathematical writings and published an edition of Archimedes which included almost all of his writings. He also commented on various works; thus a note by Leon is noted in a copy of Euclid's Elements . The preserved scientific writings of Leon are astrological in nature.

Cyril of Saloniki was a student of Leon . In literature, Leon the mathematician was often confused with Leon Magistros Choirosphaktes , who died after 919.

literature

• David Pingree : Leo the Mathematician . In: Charles Coulston Gillispie (Ed.): Dictionary of Scientific Biography . tape 8 : Jonathan Homer Lane - Pierre Joseph Macquer . Charles Scribner's Sons, New York 1973, p. 190–192 (with an overview of the works).

Web links

• Literature by and about Leon the mathematician in the catalog of the German National Library