Book of Optics

Book of Optics
Cover page for Ibn al-Haytham's Book of Optics in the print edition from 1572
AuthorIbn al-Haytham
Original titleكتاب المناظر
LanguageArabic
SubjectOptics
Published1011 to 1021
Front page of the Latin Opticae Thesaurus, which included Alhazen's Book of Optics, showing rainbows, the use of parabolic mirrors to set ships on fire, distorted images caused by refraction in water, and other optical effects.

The Book of Optics (Arabic: كتاب المناظر, romanized: Kitāb al-Manāẓir; Latin: De Aspectibus or Perspectiva; Italian: Deli Aspecti) is a seven-volume treatise on optics and other fields of study composed by the medieval Arab scholar Ibn al-Haytham, known in the West as Alhazen or Alhacen (965 – c. 1040 AD).

The Book of Optics presented experimentally founded arguments against the widely held extramission theory of vision (as held by Euclid in his Optica), and proposed the modern intromission theory, the now accepted model that vision takes place by light entering the eye. The book is also noted for its early use of the scientific method, its description of the camera obscura, and its formulation of Alhazen's problem. The book extensively affected the development of optics, physics and mathematics in Europe between the 13th and 17th centuries.

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