Al Achsasi al Mouakket

Muḥammad al-Akhṣāṣī al-Muwaqqit (Arabic: محمد الاخصاصي الموقت) was an Egyptian astronomer whose calendarium and catalogue of stars, al-Durrah al-muḍīyah fī al-ʻamāl al-shamsīyah ('Pearls of brilliance upon the solar operations'), was written at Cairo about 1650.^[1] Al-Akhsasi was a shaykh, a learned elder, of the Grand Mosque of the university of Cairo, where his name al-Muwaqqit reflected his position regulating the times and hours at the mosque. His name Akhsasi connects him in origin to a village in the Faiyum, southwest of Cairo.^[2]

No copies of his book were known to Western astronomers or historians of science until 1895;^[3] thus he did not appear in the standard French and English bibliographies and library catalogues of the 19th century.

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