¹ There are two related and very helpful articles by North, John on this subject: “Celestial Influence - The major premiss of astrology,” in Zambelli, P. (ed.), Astrologi hallucinati (Berlin and New York, 1986), pp. 45–100Google Scholar, reprinted in North, J.D., Stars, Minds and Fate (London, 1989), pp. 243–98;Google Scholar and “Medieval concepts of celestial influence: A survey,” in Curry, Patrick (ed.), Astrology, Science and Society (Woodbridge, Suffolk and Wolfeboro, 1987), pp. 5–17.Google Scholar

² The heating, explains Aristotle, is not due to a hot quality of the heavenly bodies, but to the movement and the contact together: “the circular motion (…) dissolves and inflames by its motion whatever part of the lower world is nearest to it, 340b10–14, on the same topic see al-Kindī, , On the Proximate Efficient Cause [in Rasā'il al-Kindī al-falsafiyya, ed. Rīda, Abū, 2 vols. (Cairo, 1950–1953)], vol. I, p. 223, lines 16 ff.: “It was advanced in the physical discussions that movement produces heat in the elements and what is compounded from the elements, by accepted arguments. The elements therefore receive the influence either through movement or through contact (bi-al-mumāssa). That which is touching the last of (the elements) is neither hot nor cold nor moist nor dry; therefore they receive through contact with him only the influence of movement. That which is touching [the last of the elements] varies with the [heavenly] bodies, their movement and position, because some of them are greater and some smaller and some slower and some faster and some more distant and some closer and on account of all of the terminations of the [heavenly] bodies, in speed and slowness - when it is ascribed to the essence [of the heavenly bodies] - and in height and lowness and distance and closeness. We find the things which effect heat in other things by movement do so more intensely whenever they are large, close, fast, and low. Therefore the cause of the genesis of heat in the elements is from the first element moving over them … (etc.).”Google Scholar

³ Aristotle calls this either fire or “a sort of fire” (hoion pyr, 340b 33) but says that the name of “fire” is not totally appropriate, for fire is strictly speaking “the ebullition of a dry exhalation” (341b21); see Sharples, R.W., “The school of Alexander?,” in Sorabji, R. (ed.), Aristotle Transformed (London, 1990), pp. 83–112, esp. pp. 98–9.Google Scholar

⁴ Abū Bishr Mattā's translation is edited together with the Kindī-cricle translation by Ruland, H.-J., Die arabischen Fassungen von zwei Schriften des Alexander von Aphrodisias: Über die Vorsehung und Über das liberum arbitrium, diss. (Saarbruken, 1976).Google Scholar Like Ruland, we call Abū Bishr Mattā's translation D18 and the Kindī-circle translation D15, following their numbering in Dietrich's list of preserved Arabic translations of Alexander's works in Dietrich, A., “Die arabische Version einer unbekannten Schrift des Alexander von Aphrodisias über die Differentia specifica,” Nachrichten von der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen, phil.-hist. KI. (1964): 85–148.Google Scholar Some Greek fragments of Alexander concerning providence are preserved apud Cyril of Alexandria and published by Grant, R. M., “Greek literature in the treatise ‘De Trinitate’ and Cyril ‘Contra Julianum’,” Journal of Theological Studies, 15 (1964): 265–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Four of these correspond to passages of Abū Bishr Mattā's translation, and support its authenticity. Others may well have had a different source. I intend to write about this elsewhere [S. F.]. On the earlier version of Alexander's Peri pronoias made in the Kindī-circle, see below, pp. 129 ff.

⁵ On the introduction of the latter, see the subtle analysis of Mansfeld, J., “Diaphonia in the argument of Alexander De fato Chs. 1–2,” Phronesis, 33 (1988): 181–207CrossRefGoogle Scholar, who also compares it with the incipit of Peri pronoias. See also Ibid., p. 181 n. 4 a discussion on the authenticity of Mantissa XXV. I do believe that this should be regarded as authentic, and none of the arguments advanced until now appears strong enough to prove the opposite; the quality and the style of writing and also the content of Mantissa XXV are such as one would expect from a genuine work of Alexander. I hope to write about this elsewhere [S. F.]. Anyway, since the section we quote from Mantissa XXV is very similar to a corresponding one in De fato (whose authenticity is not questionnable), this problem does not touch directly on our point here.

⁶ “Problems and solutions,” in four books, edited by Bruns, I. in Supplementum Aristotelicum (Berlin, 1892), II. 2.Google Scholar

⁷ The authenticity of some of them is questionable. Quaestio 2.21 is stylistically anomalous and contradicts in its content at least one passage of Quaestio 1.25, which is very likely to be authentic. I intend to write about this elsewhere [S. F.].Google Scholar

⁸ It is the only one which uses as a source the passage of Met. XII.6, 1072a 10–18 mentioned above, for this latter is probably the source for Quaestio 1.25's obscure developments about the two movements of the planetary spheres.Google Scholar

⁹ See on this Sharples, R.W., “Alexander of Aphrodlisias on Divine Providence: Two problems,” Classical Quarterly, 32 (1982): 198–211.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁰ See Aristotle Meteor. I.3, 339a21–32 mentioned above, on causal relationship by contact.Google Scholar

¹¹ See also Arist, Ps.. De mundo 39Th20–3.Google Scholar

¹² This point connects Peri pronoias with Quaestio 2.3, see below, p. 125.Google Scholar

¹³ The title of Quaestio 2.19 in the Greek manuscripts is: “That, <if> the universe is eternal and the essence of the universe is its ordering, this too should be in its proper being” (trans. Sharples).+the+universe+is+eternal+and+the+essence+of+the+universe+is+its+ordering,+this+too+should+be+in+its+proper+being”+(trans.+Sharples).>Google Scholar But there is good reason to assume that Alexander himself did not give the titles to the individual Quaestiones, see Bruns', I. preface to Supplementum Aristotelicum, II.2, p. XI.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Aristotle De caelo said that the movement of the heavens is eternal by nature: see e.g. 1.2, 269a5–7; II.7, 289a15–16.Google Scholar

¹⁵ See Sharples, R.W., “The unmoved mover and the motion of the heavens in Alexander of Aphrodisias,” Apeiron, 17 (1983): 62–6, esp. p. 62Google Scholar, who pointed out in Quaestiones 2.19 and 1.25 that, although the movement of the heavens depends on the first ousia they ceaselessly desire, their relationship with the latter is not analysed by Alexander in terms of pronoia.

¹⁶ “What the power is that comes to be, from the movement of the divine body, in the body adjacent to it (geitniōnti, see Arist. Meteor. 338b21–2 quoted above, pp. 120–1) which is mortal and subject to coming to be”;Google Scholar English trans. Sharples, R.W., Alexander of Aphrodisias Quaestiones 1.1- 2.15 (London, 1992);Google Scholar Italian translation in Fazzo, S., “Alessandro d'Afroclisia e Tolomeo: aristotelismo e astrologia fra il II e il III sec. d.C.,” Rivista di Storia della Filosofia, 4 (1988): 627–49, transl. pp. 644–9.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Contra Moraux, P., “Alexander von Aphroclisias Quaest. 2.3,” Hermes, 95 (1967): 159–69, esp. p. 163 n. 2.Google Scholar

¹⁸ 48.19–20 Bruns, trans. Sharples.

¹⁹ Again, see Arist. Meteor. I.1–3 on the action by proximity; an even closer parallel is between 48. 5–8 Bruns and Ps. Arist. De mundo 397b27–30, see Moraux, P., “Alexander von Aphrodisias Quaest. 2.3,” p.163.Google Scholar

²⁰ See Fazzo, “Alessandro d'Afrodisia e Tolomeo…,” esp. pp. 640–3.Google Scholar

²¹ See Endress, G., Proclus Arabus (Beirut, 1973), and Zimmermann, F.W., “The origins of the so-called Theology of Aristotle,” in Kraye, J., Ryan, W., Schmitt, C. (eds.), Pseudo-Aristotle in the Middle Ages, Warburg Institute Surveys and Texts, 11 (London, 1986), pp. 110–240.Google Scholar

²² Endress, Proclus Arabus, p. 326 remarks on the Proclus' translations in the Kindī-circle that they “contain a number of considerable additions and alterations (…). While some of these are merely explanatory glosses, most of the corollaries, insertions, and modifications, also a few omissions, involve a deliberate revision of the author's metaphysical system.”Google Scholar

²³ He says this about his own philosophical endeavors, in the best Greek fashion, but it evidently applies to the translations as well; see al-Kindī, On First Philosophy, Abū Rīda I. 103.10f.Google Scholar

²⁴ However, it is worth mentioning that G. Endress was apparently the first to analyse in detail the Arabic translation of a number of Quaestiones (among which Quaestio 2.3 and Quaestio 2.19) as Kindī-cricle' texts. See his proclus Arbus, esp. pp. 64–7. On Peri pronias, see Zimmermann, F.W., “The origins”, p. 180.²⁵ See Zimmermann's, F.Google Scholar remarks on the Kindī-circle adaptors; “Since they changed what they disliked, they must have liked what they retained. [Such texts] give a much fuller picture than do al-Kindī's own writings of the kind of philosophy he was commending to his public.” Zimmermann, F., “AL-Kindī,” in Young, M.J.L., Latham, J.D., Serjeant, R.B. (eds), Religion, Learning and Science in the 'Abbasid Period, The Cambridge History of Arabic Literature (Cambridge, 1990), chap. 20, pp. 364–9, see on p. 366.Google Scholar

²⁶ vE34, “On the power <coming> from the movement of the sublime body to the bodies falling under generation and corruption,” is text number 34 in van Ess's supplement to Dietrich's list (van Ess, J., “Über einige neue Fragmente es Alexander von Aphrodisias und des Proklos in arabischer Übersetzung,” Der Islam, 42 (1966): 148–68).CrossRefGoogle Scholar A list of the correspondences between Dietrich's and van Ess's lists and the surviving Greek texts of Alexander is given by Sharples, R.W., “Alexander of Aphrodisias: scholasticism and innovation,” Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt, XXXVI, 2 (1987): 1176–243, on pp. 1192–3. We read the text from MS Carullah 1279, fol. 64a13–64b21.Google Scholar

²⁷ Only the idea of two powers in the simple bodies and three powers in the compound bodies (“in the simple, changing bodies are two powers, the first of them from the first body and the other from themselves. In the compound bodies are three powers, the first of them from the first sublime body and the second from the simple, changing bodies and the third from themselves,” see below, Appendix, p. 150) does not seem to have a direct parallel in the Greek original, and I'm not sure it reflects exactly what Alexander intended to say.Google Scholar Anyway, it may well be seen as an exegesis of Alexander's statement about the compound bodies having a share in more powers (pleionōn koinonounta dynameōn, p. 50.18 Bruns).Google Scholar

²⁸ The first is: “I say that because of this power come the movements of these bodies to their proper places, and because of these movements every one of them comes to its completion and its perfection, just as the Sage related in the De caelo (kitāb alsamā') in the fourth book (maqāla)”; but this idea appears nowhere in De caelo. A second is: “…I say that the vegetative soul is first, then the animal, then the intellectual and rational. The Sage has treated how that is in the De anima (kitāb alnafs)”; somehow the adaptor may be referring to De anima II.3, 414a29–415a14; but the reference is so generic that it does not need to refer to any specific passage. The third reference is: “This first form coming to be from the sublime heavenly body in matter <is> the form of the first bodies and <is> the cause of the oppositeness of their substances and their natures just as the Sage related in his book which is called the Metaphysics (ba'd al-tabī'a) and that is sufficiently treated here”; this also is not found as such in Metaphysics, not at least in the Greek original of it.+the+form+of+the+first+bodies+and++the+cause+of+the+oppositeness+of+their+substances+and+their+natures+just+as+the+Sage+related+in+his+book+which+is+called+the+Metaphysics+(ba'd+al-tabī'a)+and+that+is+sufficiently+treated+here”;+this+also+is+not+found+as+such+in+Metaphysics,+not+at+least+in+the+Greek+original+of+it.>Google Scholar

²⁹ Tadbīr, lit. “direction” or “governing,” is the only word this translator has for pronoia; its plural form appears only here in the title. Abū Bishr Mattā will use 'ināya instead. Kindī tends to use tadbīr or various phrases (see below, pp. 142–3)Google Scholar. Goulet, R. and Aouad's, M. article “Alexandros d'Aphrodisias,” in Goulet, R. (ed.), Dictionnaire des Philosophes Antiques (Paris, 1989), vol. I, p. 137Google Scholar translates D15's title “Traité d'Alexandre sur le gouvernement des sphères.” Cf. above, note 4 on Ruland's edition. Whereas D18 is very likely to come from a former Syriac version of the Greek Peri pronoias (since apparently Abū Bishr Mattā did not know Greek), there is no reason to assume that D15 was translated from Syriac, contra Ruland, pp. 107–8.

³⁰ In the Escurial manuscript of D18, 87b-93a, that is more than two fifths of the whole treatise.Google Scholar

³¹ For Alexander, the heavens govern our world by their own natural movement; how could they be free to do otherwise? For they can't act against their nature, and also, the circular movement doesn't have any opposite (see Arist, . De caelo 1.4, 270b32 ff.).Google Scholar

³² See above, pp. 123–4.

³³ See al-Fihrist, Flügel, p. 257 line 17.Google Scholar

³⁴ Cf. note 31.

³⁵ The parallels Ruland suggests (De gen. et corr. 336b32, and De caelo 273a4–6) appear to be misleading (De gen. et corr. is also quoted according to a lectio deterior, i.e. entelechē instead of the correct endelechē). Unfortunately, we cannot explore here the possibility that Philoponus is the source for this use of Arist. De gen. et corr. See Davidson, H.A., Proofs for Eternity, Creation and the Existence of God in Medieval Islamic and Jewish Philosophy (New York and Oxford, 1987), esp. pp. 86–116.Google Scholar

³⁶ De caelo I. 9, 279a25–30.Google Scholar

³⁷ I.e. the world cannot be an infinite (apeiron) body because then it could not move circularly, because for doing so it would need an infinite power, and since “nothing of what is limited has an infinite power” (275b 22–3) there should be something also infinite to move the infinite; but two infinites cannot exist.Google Scholar

³⁸ Cf. De caelo I.7, 275b22–3. The same statement of Aristotle, outhen echei apeiron dynamis tōn peperasmenōn, occurs among Philoponus' arguments against the Aristotelian doctrine of the eternity of the world. Both here and by Philoponus, the argument is accepted, but used to claim the opposite of what Aristotle did. Nevertheless, there is an important difference between these two un-Aristotelian uses of this argument: Philoponus fights openly and at length against Aristotle and claims that he is wrong, whereas here it is striking that D15, while claiming the temporal finitude of the universe, not only never openly rejects Aristotle's view, but even pretends to report Aristotelian views. On the fortune of Philoponus' arguments against the eternity of the word among the Arabs, see Davidson, H.A., Proofs for Eternity;Google Scholaridem, “John Philoponus as a source of Medieval Islamic and Jewish proofs of creation,” Journal of the American Oriental Society (1969): 357–91.

³⁹ Other quotations of Aristotle in D15 (from Phys. at p. 59; from Met. at p. 93) are not independent but derive from the original Greek of Alexander, as the parallel with D18 shows. A couple of citations from De caelo (93.1–4 and 93.5–7 Ruland) which are found in D18 are missing in D15, and so is missing in D15 another couple of citations (p. 59.8 and 61.5 Ruland) whose origin is rather obscure: they both claim that according to Aristotle the providence extends “until the heaven of the Moon.” Although they are not found in any preserved work of Aristotle, they have parallels in later reports of Aristotle's views, e.g. Diogenes Laertius 5.32, Atticus fr.3.56 f., 69 ff. des Places. See for further details: Sharples, “Alexander of Aphrodisias on Divine Providence,” p. 198 n. 10; idem, “Alexander of Aphrodisias: scholasticism and innovation,” p. 1216.

⁴⁰ See both D18 and D15 at p. 60 Ruland.

⁴¹ Modern scholars also have failed to recognize it. For example, Ruland at pp. 34 n. 1 and 115.2 suggests that the quotation may come from Aristotle's Peri philosophias;Google ScholarBruns, I. (“Studien zu Alexander von Aphrodisias -III, Lehre von der Vorsehung,” Rheinisches Museum, 45 (1890): 223–35, esp. p. 234)Google Scholar prefers to eliminate the reference to Aristotle from the Greek fragment; whereas Grant (“Greek literature in ‘De Trinitate’,” p. 278) correctly suggests that “what Alexander taught he must have regarded as Aristotle's.”Google Scholar

⁴² Aristotelis De caelo et Meteorologica, ed. 'Badawi, A., Islamica, , 28 (Cairo, 1961), p. 267.Google Scholar See Endress, G., Die arabisehen Übersetzungen von Aristoteles' Schrift De Caelo, diss. (Frankfurt am Main, 1966), p. 244.Google Scholar

⁴³ De caelo II.11, 291a31–3. “Pour les détails relatifs à l'ordre des astres, le philosophe renvoie aux travaux des spécialistes, comme Platon l'avait fait quelques années plus tôt,”Google ScholarMoraux, P., Aristote Du Ciel (Paris, 1965), p. CIV. This is therefore not a reference to a real work of Aristotle in D15; contra Ruland on this passage (p. 105 n. 2), who suggests that D15 refers to the treatise Astronomikon which Diogenes Laertiu attributes to Aristotle.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ On general and particular astrology (katholikon, eidikōteron) see, for example, Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos II.1.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Unless one of them is cryptically preserved at the very beginning of vE33 in the obscure statement that the world's essence “has no telos (ghāya) over it”, see below, Appendix, p. 152.

⁴⁶ See above, p. 135.

⁴⁷ This theory is in harmony with al-Kindī; and with the treatise D16, wrongly attributed to Alexander, preserved also in the same Carullah 1279 (69a-b). The attribution of D16 to Alexander, although never questioned until now, is false. Matter is here said to be a non-existent, and privation an existent: which is just the opposite of what Aristotle (Phys. I. 8. 192a 2 ff.) and consequently Alexander says (e. g. Quaestio I.24. 38.17–20 Bruns). Moreover, D16 discusses a passage of Arist. Phys. I.8 which Alexander discusses in his Quaestio 1.24 and ap. Simpl. In Phys. 236.24 ca.-238.14 with utterly different arguments. I intend to give fuller arguments elsewhere [S. F.]. Another treatise misattributed to Alexander is D29 “That every separate cause is present in everything as well as in nothing, according to Aristotle.” Already P. Thillet ap. Goulet – Aouad, “Alexandros d'Aphrodisias,” (p. 137) doubted its attribution to Alexander, and Zimmermann, F. recently recognized in this text Procl. El. Theol. prop. 98, whose incipit is: “Every separate cause (aition chōriston) is at once everywhere and nowhere.”Google Scholar See Zimmermann's forthcoming article “Proclus Arabus Rides Again.” From the content of both D29 and Prod. El. Theol. prop. 98Google Scholar, it is now clear that the translation of the title of this treatise “Que toute cause separée est dans toutes les choses, et non pas dans une seulement solon l'opinion d'Aristote” given by Thillet, in Alexandre d'Aphrodise, Traité du destin (Paris, 1984), p. LIV n. 3 is inaccurate.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ The second part starts from: “So if this is as we have described, we resume and say also that the world has two parts…,” see below, Appendix, p. 153.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Section 17 says that all things possess being because of the first being (Badawi, 'A. (ed.), Neoplatonici apud Arabes. Procli: Liber (Pseudo-Aristotelis) de expositione bonitatis purae (Liber de Causis). Procli: De aeternitate mundi. Procli: Quaestiones naturales. Hermetis: De castigatione animae. Platonis (Pseudo-): Liber Quartus, Islamica, 10 (Cairo, 1955), p. 19)Google Scholar Section 8 describes how the intellect is director (mudabbir) to all things beneath it (Ibid., pp. 11–12). Section 22 calls God the mudabbir (ibid., pp. 23–4).

⁵⁰ The idea of nature as a subordinate creator under God is rather found in Philoponus ap. Simpi. in Phys. p. 1145.9–11.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Therefore, in al-Kindī's physical, cosmological and astrological writings there is no contradiction between astral causality and providence, as one might otherwise assume. For example Atiyeh (“but neither does he explain how the Divine Providence works”: Atiyeh, G., Al-Kindī (Rawalpindi, 1966), p. 69) and Fakhry (“his repeated insistence on the all-pervasiveness of divine providence and God's role as the creator and superintendent of the world … would appear to run counter to the thoroughgoing determinism of popular astrology”:Google ScholarFakhry, M., A History of Islamic Philosohy (New York, 1970), p. 101).Google Scholar

⁵² The fact that al-Kindī quotes D15 in this text was first noticed by Hasnawi, A., “Al-Kindī, al-Ibāna 'an al-'illa al-fā'īla al-qarība li al-kawn wa al-fasād (Éclaircissement de la cause efficiente prochaine de la génération et de la corruption),”Google Scholar in Jacob, A. (Gen. ed.), L'Encyclopédie philosophique universelle. Vol. III: Les oeuvres philosophiques, ed. Mattéi, J.F. (Paris, 1992), t.I, p. 656.Google Scholar

⁵³ Compare his reference to “our physical discussions” beginning the section on the four causes, at p. 217.16.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ As Abū Rīda pointed out (p. 219 n. 7), some of the ideas found here were also put by al-Kindī into his On the Explanation that the Nature of the Heavens is Different from the Natures of the Four Elements (Abū Rīda II. 40–6), to which al-Kindī refers in On the Prostration of the Furthest Body (Abū Rīda I. 253), which in turn was written after On the Proximate Efficient Cause. On the Explanation that the Nature of the Heavens is Different from the Natures of the Four Elements describes in an Aristotelian way the elements and their properties and describes the celestial sphere as incorruptible, having no opposite into which it may corrupt since it does not contain the four qualities.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Note the similarity to De gen. et corr. 1.3, 318a6 f. where Aristotle leaves aside discussion of the first cause which belongs to first philosophy to turn to the second, material cause and later to the moving cause of the heavens, saying “to know the unmoved principle [i.e. God] is work of the other philosophy, the first philosophy (tēs heteras kai proteras … philosophias). Similarities make it appear that in his On the Proximate Efficient Cause al-Kindī is producing his own version of De gen. et corr.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ And its pseudo-reference to Aristotle's Astrologia (see above, p. 137).

⁵⁷ Even more detailed on this point is the Greek Quaestio 2.3, 48.27–49. 14 Bruns.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Note also that the statement “the actions of the soul follow from the mixings of the bodies,” is strikingly close to the title and to the incipit of the work of Galen, Quod animi mores (Hoti tais tou sōmatos krasesin hai tēs psychēs dynameis hepontai).Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Al-Kindī, , Cinq épîtres, Centre d'histoire des sciences et des doctrines, Histoire des sciences et de la philosophie arabes, C.N.R.S. (Paris, 1976), pp. 71–2.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ See also Abū Rīda I. 226, lines 3 ff., that every body has from its origination a character according to the measure of its mixture, following the variation of proximity, speed, positioning of the planets, etc.Google Scholar

⁶¹ E.g. Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos II.2 seems to be the source for al-Kindī's remarks about the physical characteristics of the inhabitants of the different climes.Google Scholar

⁶² For another reworking of an originally Greek source by al-Kindī, see Rosenthal, F., “al-Kindī and Ptolemy,” Studi orientalistici in onore di Giorgio Levi della Vida, 2 vols. (Rome, 1956), vol. II, pp. 436–56.Google Scholar

⁶³ On this see Walzer, R., Greek into Arabic, Essays on Islamic Philosophy, Oriental Studies, 1 (Oxford, 1962), p. 202.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ See Alex. Quaestio 1.25, 40.10 Bruns if, Alex. ap. Simplicius In Phys. 1218.20–36 and 1261.30–1262.4; De principiis, French trans.Google ScholarBadawi, A. in La transmission de la philosophie grecque au monde arabe, 1st ed. (Paris, 1968), p.124.7 ff. [2nd ed. (Paris, 1987), pp. 135–53, on p. 138 ff.];Google ScholarSharples, , “Alexander of Aphrodisias on Divine Providence,” esp. Appendix: “Sphere-souls and unmoved movers,” p. 208 ff.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ We are looking forward to the edition with French translation, Emma Gannagé is preparing of these and other Arabic translations of Alexander's texts preserved both in Arabic and in Greek.Google Scholar