Name Sind Ali | Role Engineer | |
Sind ibn Ali-Musa, Sind ibn ʿAli (died after 864 AD), was a renowned Sindhi Muslim astronomer, translator, mathematician and engineer. His father Ali-Musa was a convert to Islam and an aristocrat who lived in Mansura, Sindh. Sind ibn ʿAli traveled to Baghdad and received the best education available.
He is known to have translated and modified the Zij al-Sindhind. The Zij al-Sindhind was the first astronomical table ever introduced in the Muslim World. As a mathematician Sind ibn ʿAli was a colleague of al-Khwarizmi and worked closely with Yaqub ibn Tariq together they calculated the diameter of the Earth and other astronomical bodies. He also wrote a commentary on Kitab al-gabr wa-l-muqabala and helped prove the works of al-Khwarizmi. The decimal point notation to the Arabic numerals was introduced by Sind ibn Ali.
According to Ibn Abi Usaibia: the Banu Musa brothers out of professional jealousy kept him away from Abbasid Caliph al-Mutawakkil at his new capital Samarra and had caused Sind ibn ʿAli to be sent away to Baghdad. Both Ja'far Muhammad ibn Musa ibn Shakir and Ahmad ibn Musa ibn Shakir delegated the work of digging a great canal instead to Al-Farghani and thus ignoring Sind ibn ʿAli, the better engineer. Al-Farghani committed a great error, making the beginning of the canal deeper than the rest and water never reached the new garrison of Al-Ja'fariya. News of this greatly angered al-Mutawakkil and the two Banu Musa brothers were saved from severe punishment only by the gracious willingness of Sind ibn ʿAli, to vouch the corrections of Al-Farghani's calculations thus risking his own welfare and possibly his life.