AUB Press

This is a detailed examination of Chapter Five of the Third Treatise of Jamshīd Ghiyāth al-Dīn al-Kāshī (al-Kāshānī, d. 1429) from his book, The Key to Arithmetic (Miftāḥ al-Ḥisāb), also known as The Computers' Key (Miftāḥ al-Ḥussāb). A facsimile of the original manuscript is reproduced in Chapter Three of the text, along with an opposite-page translation and commentary. A sexagesimal multiplication table, useful to those engaged in computations from Babylonian, Greek, Arabic, and Byzantine scientific writings, is included in a back pocket of the book.

​The Greek mathematician Autolykos wrote these treatises around 320 BC. They form the oldest material on Greek mathematical astronomy that has survived in a well preserved form. The books contain the complete Greek text and its translation into English, the latter published for the first time, while the Greek text is based on the critical edition of Joseph Mogenet. The Books of Autolykos deal with the simple geometry of points and large circles on a sphere, applying the axiomatic method systematically for the first time. These treatises give a clear insight into the status of Greek mathematical astronomy just before the initiation of the famous School of Alexandria. ​

In Islam, the concept that the Word was revealed to man in its highest and final form in the Qurʾan has made it the foundation of all Muslim artistic expression. The authors of this study present a collection of published transcriptions of Qurʾanic inscriptions on Islamic monuments from Jerusalem, Cairo, and Damascus in order to determine how the inscriptions were used and what patterns, if any, might contribute to an appreciation of the religious content of a work of art. The study is limited to the world of medieval Islam when religious foundations were at their greatest strength and vitality, and found their most integrated expression. Volume I presents the texts and photographs of the inscriptions, while Volume II gives three indexes of the verses: in order of the suras, used geographically, and according to their locations within buildings.

This is a critical essay describing and evaluating the poetry of the end of the nineteenth century and its importance in the development of the modern aesthetic. To quote the Times Literary Supplement, this book “has the merit of hitting most of the nails involved firmly on their proper heads."

​The Profile of a Neighborhood presents an overview of the findings of the Ras Beirut Well-Being Survey, conducted in 2009–2010 by members of AUB's Faculty of Health Sciences. It represents the efforts of a multidisciplinary team drawn from across the American University of Beirut, and provides the first systematic portrait of Ras Beirut in the last forty years. The survey's goal was to provide up-to-date sociological, demographic, and health information about neighborhood residents, a valuable snapshot of life in Ras Beirut shortly before the conflict in Syria brought an influx of Syrian citizens to the neighborhood. The book presents a wide variety of statistical details about the residents of Ras Beirut, including marital status, nationality, household structure, religiosity, income and household wealth, education, and quality of life. Its findings suggest that even in Ras Beirut, which is considered an affluent neighborhood of which AUB is a part, it is possible to find extremes existing side by side—wealth and poverty, social and economic inequality, and the corresponding effects on well-being.

These are the proceedings of a January 1983 symposium organized by the American University of Beirut and the Goethe Institute at a midpoint in the Lebanese Civil War when the Beirut city center was being cleared of the destructive effects of the war in preparation for reconstruction. The ten papers address the damage sustained during the first part of the civil war, and make recommendations for reconstruction. Lessons from the post-World War II reconstruction of Europe and an overview of Beirut's previous history are included. This publication contains thirteen illustrations, four maps, and twenty-one photos.​