In addition to the works of the ancients, and perhaps more surprisingly, monks collected the works of Islamic thinkers, many of whom were far ahead of Europeans in their knowledge of medicine, astronomy, physics, and mathematics. The Canon of Medicine by Abū-ʿAlī al-Ḥusayn ibn-ʿAbdallāh Ibn-Sīnā—known to Europeans as Avicenna—was the go-to text for medical study, while Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi’s calculus pushed Christian thinkers to new heights of mathematical discovery.
