Jazari, the greatest engineer of the 13th century, is a magnificent genius of the history of universal science. As an unforgettable scientist in terms of his contributions, inventions, perspective and engineering philosophy, Jazari made technological designs for more than fifty machines and devices and did not only theoretically plan these machines but produced and operated them. His scientific and practical legacy it is still up to date and interesting for the 21st century world. He has inspired a lot of Eastern and Western mechanics, especially with his machines focused on time use and management.

He whose full name is Badi’ al-Zaman Abu al-‘Izz ibn Isma’il ibn al-Razzaz al-Jazari was an engineer who lived around the year 1200 in the Artuqid period in the region of Diyarbakır (Amid). He served as a palace engineer for 25 years (1181-1206) in the Artuqid Palace, and was a strong representative of a tradition known as ‘Hiyal’ during the Hellenistic period as well as in the Advanced Period of Pneumatic and Islamic Civilization. Today, Jazari is considered to be the most important engineer of the entire Middle Ages. A significant portion of the machines briefly known as Kitab-ul Hiyal, the original name being Kitab Al-Masah‘ beyn al-‘ilm and El-‘amel en-Nafi’ fi Testa’ti’l-Hiyal’ were collected following the request of the great ruler Nasireddin Mahmud (1200-1222.) The full name of the book can be translated as “The Correlation of Knowledge and Application in Mechanical Science.” Although he was known to have written his book in 1206, we have no exact information about the death and birth dates of Jazari. The district between the Euphrates and Tigris was called Al-Jazeera (Island), which is why he used the nickname Al-Jazari.