Ābu Hanīfah Āhmad ibn Dawūd Dīnawarī (828 – 896) was a polymath excelling as much in astronomy, agriculture, botany & metallurgy & as he did in geography, mathematics & history. He was born in Dinawar (in modern day Western Iran, halfway between Hamadan & Kermanshah). He studied astronomy, mathematics & mechanics in Isfahan & philology & poetry in Kufa & Basra. He died on July 24, 896 at Dinawar. His most renowned contribution is Book of Plants, for which he is considered the founder of Arabic botany.
Al-Dinawari is certainly one of the earliest Muslim botanists. His work, largely confined to the flora of Arabia, is perhaps the most comprehensive & methodical philological work on herbs. His treatise Kitab al-Nabat is characterized as “the most comprehensive & methodically most superior work of this philologically-orientated botany.”
Al-Dinawari’s information is based on older written sources, on oral information from Bedouins, and, occasionally, on personal observation. His book Kitab al-nabat consists of two sections, one being an alphabetical inventory of plant names (and thus the first alphabetically-ordered specialized dictionary), the second section contains monographs on plants used for specific practical purposes: kindling; dyeing; bow-making.
There is a chapter on mushrooms & similar plants (to the latter belong the parasitic broomrapes Balanophoraceae). Al-Dinawari also devoted one chapter to the classification of plants (tajnis al-nabat) which he mentions in one of the volumes that have survived.
In his exposition on the earth, Al-Dinawari describes a variety of soils, explaining which is good for planting, its properties & qualities, & also describes plant evolution from its birth to its death, including the phases of growth & production of flower & fruit. He also covers various crops, including cereals, vineyards & date palms. Relying on his predecessors, he also explains trees, mountains, plains, deserts, aromatic plants, woods, plants used as dyes, honey, bees, etc.
