Reviews of Jonathan Lyons’ House of Wisdom: How the Arabs Transformed Western Civilization:

“Former Reuters editor and foreign correspondent Lyons fashions an accessible study about early Western acquisition of scientific knowledge from the Arab world.

Wading through centuries of anti-Muslim propaganda, Lyons traces how the brilliance of Arab knowledge, brought back by visiting scholars from intellectual centers like Baghdad, Antioch and Cordoba, transformed Western notions of science and philosophy. The Western “recovery” of classical learning, as championed later in the Renaissance, was actually first transmitted by these early Arab giants of learning, many of whom emerged from the Baghdad think tank, translation bureau and book repository called the House of Wisdom (Bayt al-Hikma), built by Caliph al-Mansur in the eighth century. The Baghdad court linked the triumphs of classical wisdom—especially that of the Greeks—with Persian, Hindu and other traditions, spurring the work of significant Arab thinkers such as al-Khwarizmi, who developed star tables, algebra and the astrolabe; al-Idrisi, who accepted a royal commission by Roger II of once-Muslim Sicily to construct the first comprehensive world’s map, The Book of Roger; Avicenna, a Persian philosopher and physician who was an authority on medicine; and Averroes, the Muslim philosopher whose commentaries on Aristotle were a major contribution to Western thought. Lyons capably delineates the fascinating journey of this knowledge to the West, highlighting a few key figures, including Adelard of Bath, whose years spent in Antioch paid off grandly in bringing forth his translations of Euclid and al-Khwarizmi; and Michael Scot, science adviser and court astrologer to Frederick II, who translated Avicenna and Averroes. Lyons cleverly—though too briefly—ties these early theories to the work of Thomas Aquinas and Copernicus and the subsequent ‘invention of the West.’

Pertinent study that should aid in a better understanding between East and West.” From Kirkus Reviews

Advance praise for Jonathan Lyons’ House of Wisdom: How the Arabs Transformed Western Civilization:

“A wonderful and important book which for the first time presents the western debt to mediaeval Arabic learning  in a clear and  accessible manner. The House of Wisdom shows how the melting pot of the Islamic world brought together different systems of thought and science, so fusing the learning of ancient India, Persia, Babylonia and the Hellenistic world for the first time,  then passing on that knowledge to the hungry mediaeval West.

In an age when the media is filled with negative stereotypes of Arabs and the Islamic world, Jonathan Lyons presents a much needed corrective that shows much the West learned at the feet of the East- from techniques of gardening to notions of courtly love, from the knowledge of paper making and cartography to medicine and science. From the azimuth to the zenith, from algebra to the zero, so much of what the West takes for granted came to us from Arab world through Islamic Spain and Sicily. The House of Wisdom is a fascinating book which opens up a whole new world, and in the process rolls back centuries of Islamophobic propaganda.”
William Dalrymple

“Jonathan Lyons has written a wide-ranging and highly engaging exploration of the intellectual and scientific glories of Islamic civilization. At a time when Islamic culture is routinely demonized as backward and barbaric when compared to the advancements of the West, The House of Wisdom reminds us that it wasn't so very long ago that the shoe was on the other foot.

Lyons succeeds in demonstrating the revered place of scientific and philosophical thought in Islamic culture and in highlighting its achievements. As a result, Islamic thought emerges not as something waiting passively through the ages to be exploited by the west, but as a grand intellectual endeavor on its own terms: complex, humane, and intricately beautiful.”
Paul M. Cobb
University of Pennsylvania

“With a storyteller's eye for the revealing detail and an artist's feel for the sweep of history, Jonathan Lyons has uncovered the debt that the Christian world--and Western civilization--owes to Muslim philosophy and science. House of Wisdom is a fascinating and picturesque page-turner.”
Ian Bremmer
President, Eurasia Group
Author of The J-Curve: A New Way to Understand why Countries Rise and Fall