سلاح المرايا المحرقة في كتابات المؤرخين المسلمين : بين النصوص التاريخية و الأسطورة الشعبية خلال العصر الوسيط

Abstract EN

The approach of medieval historians to the science of burning mirrors combined truth and fiction or, so to speak, the science of fiction and the fiction of science.

There is no doubt that Arabs and Muslims had taken the idea of burning mirrors from Greek culture, in various ways and to various extents, and had assimilated what they had taken.

But they also stripped this idea of its ancient origins and it became, one may say, a purely Arab-Islamic idea thanks to the contributions of Al-Kindi, Qista ibn Luke, Ahmed ibn Issa, Otarid ibn Mohammed, and Ibn al-Haytham, as this study will show.

In this research, I will use the historical scientific method, relying on the analytical approach which suits the nature and subject matter of the study.

I will also conduct an analytical study of the mechanism of historical development of the idea of burning mirrors )i.e.

the close reflection of solar rays on mirrors(, starting from the time when it dallied the imagination of Greek and Arab scientists, had echoes in the writings of historians and Arab legends, and had representations in the Renaissance era, up to the present day.

The study confirms that many of the inventions that are seen today as modern are only renewed or reconstituted discoveries or also aspects of a cyclical process that had a beginning, while emphasizing the merits of myth and imagination for science, the conflict between them, their separation, and finally their meeting when the achieved objective is the same but the means are different.