Back to Table of Contents (5)
To next page

Hendrik Bate van Mechelen: Excerpta de Secretis Albumasar di Sadan (Extracts of the Secrets of Albumasar by Sadan) (1281)

-----------------------------------------------------

Taken from: Notes on Marco Polo: ouvrage posthume‎ by Paul Pelliot

LA VERSIO LATINA DEGLI EXCERPTA DE SECRETIS ALBUMASAR DI SADAN UNA EDIZIONE par Graziella FEDERICI VESCOVINI

(Sadan was a 9th century disciple of Albumasar. )

Abu Masar (1) said: In the country of the Zanj, people see a great star rising, looking like a snake, which is only visible in the region of the sky where it rises. I have seen somebody who had observed it, and he reported that it emitted a faint light, like a piece of a cloud (2) in which there is a feint light, and also that it was always southern (since) the arc of its trajectory was small.

(1) Abu Masar: see my webpage on Abu Mashar al-Balkhi, Jafar Ibn Muhammad (d885).

(2) like a piece of a cloud: this is also found in: Pietro d'Abano (d 1316); Yakut (or Jakut) al Hamawi (1220); Ibn Madjid: As-Sufaliyya (1470); Hendrik Bate van Mechelen (1281).