Abraham bar Hiyya

Who was Abraham bar Hiyya?

Abraham bar Ḥiyya ha-Nasi was a Jewish mathematician, astronomer and philosopher, also known as Savasorda or Abraham Judaeus. He was born in Barcelona and scholars suspect he travelled to Narbonne where he is thought to have died.

Abraham bar Ḥiyya's most influential work is his Ḥibbūr ha-meshīḥah we-ha-tishboret, a Hebrew treatise on Islamic algebra and practical geometry. It was translated in 1145 into Latin by Plato of Tivoli as Liber Embadorum It contains the first complete solution of the quadratic equation x² - ax + b = 0 known in Europe and influenced the work of Leonardo Fibonacci.

Bar Ḥiyya wrote several more works on mathematics, astronomy and Jewish philosophy.