Voice of Arabic Network
Search
Peter Kirsten (Petrus Kirstenius)
Image: Unknown author (Nordisk familjebok), Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

Peter Kirsten (Petrus Kirstenius)

بيتر كيرستن

Notable figure 1577–1640 · Source: Najib al-Aqiqi, al-Mustashriqun, 3rd ed. (Cairo: Dar al-Maʿarif, 1964), vol. 2, p. 820; Yahya Murad, Muʿjam asmaʾ al-mustashriqin, p. 927 · Second source: Bibliothèque nationale de France, authority record: Kirstenius, Peter (1577-1640)

From Germany; worked in Sweden

Field: Grammar and morphology

Affiliation

Grammarian; an Arabic grammar in three parts

Biography

A physician of Breslau, he learned Arabic, Syriac and Hebrew to read Avicenna in the original, then turned to Arabic itself. He had Arabic type cut to his own design and printed at Breslau (1608–1611) the first Arabic books produced in Germany, among them an Arabic grammar in three parts, the third containing the Ajurrumiyya with translation and commentary, and Arabic poems (1608). He later became physician to the King of Sweden and professor of medicine at Uppsala.