Arabic al-kimiya'. 'The Muslims mastered Alexandrian and even certain elements of Chinese alchemy and very early in their history produced their greatest alchemist, Jabir ibn Hayyan (the Latin Geber) who lived in the 8th century and was a disciple of the Prophet's 6th infallible successor, Imam Jafar as-Sadeq (AS). Putting the cosmological and symbolic aspects of alchemy aside, one can assert that this art led to much experimentation with various materials and in the hands of Muhammad ibn Zakariyya' ar-Razi was converted into the science of chemistry. To this day certain chemical instruments such as the alembic (al-'anbiq) still bear the original Arabic names and the mercury-sulphur theory of Islamic alchemy remains as the foundation of the acid-base theory of chemistry. Ar-Razi's division of materials into animal, vegetable and mineral is still prevalent and a vast body of knowledge of materials accumulated by Islamic alchemists and chemists has survived over the centuries in both East and West. For example, the use of dyes in objects of Islamic art ranging from carpets to miniatures or the making of glass have much to do with this branch of learning which the West learnt completely from Islamic sources since alchemy was not studied and practised in the West before the translation of Arabic texts into Latin in the 11th century.

Technology
Islam inherited the millennial experience in various forms of technology from the peoples who entered the fold of Islam and the nations which became part of Dar al-islam. A wide range of technological knowledge, from the building of water wheels by the Romans to the underground water system (Qanat) by the Persians, became part and parcel of the technology of the newly founded order.

Muslims also borrowed from China, whose technology they later transmitted to the West. They also developed many forms of technology on the basis of earlier existing knowledge. For example, the metallurgical art of making the famous Damascene swords is an art which goes back to the making of steel several thousand years earlier on the Iranian Plateau.
Likewise Muslims developed new architectural techniques of vaulting, methods of ventilation, preparations of dyes, techniques of weaving, technologies related to irrigation and numerous other forms of technology, some of which survive to this day.

In general, Islamic civilisation emphasised the harmony between man and nature as seen in the traditional design of Islamic cities.

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