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A comment on Arabic, a great language, has a low profile. Parent comment

Re:Arabic, a great language, has a low profile by thisrod on Thursday October 25, 2018 @12:37AM (#18298566)
> Without the Arab and Muslim scholarship much of Greek/Roman wisdom would be lost.

I've just been on a holiday in Venice and Florence, which made me question that standard wisdom, as I learnt more about Venice and Constantinople.

The most important effect of those texts, I guess, was the Italian Renaissance. Petrarch seems to have found his books by hunting through old piles in attics, and the Venetians got (looted?) theirs directly from the Byzantines. It isn't clear to me that the Arabs had a major role.

The Spanish got their classical books from the Moors. But what did they do with those books, and why does that matter?

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Re:Arabic, a great language, has a low profile by gamegoblin on Thursday October 25, 2018 @12:59AM (#18298637)
> The Spanish got their classical books from the Moors. But what did they do with those books, and why does that matter?

Arguably, had a huge affect in kicking off the Renaissance

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toledo_School_of_Translators

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Re:Arabic, a great language, has a low profile by thrower123 on Thursday October 25, 2018 @12:46AM (#18298594)
Venice, certainly, had significant ties to Constantinople, most notably looting the hell out of it in the 4th Crusade in the 1200s.
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