The Timbuktu Scholar Who Decoded the Stars: Al-Wangari's Lost Astronomy

Timbuktu: Africa's Forgotten Center of Knowledge — Fexingo History · Jun 3, 2026 · 7m · transcript

Before telescopes, before Copernicus, a scholar in Timbuktu calculated the motion of celestial bodies with astonishing precision. Muhammad al-Mustafa al-Wangari, a 17th-century astronomer and jurist, wrote a treatise called Mīr'āt al-Ālam ('The Mirror of the Universe') that synthesized Islamic astronomy with local observation. In this episode, we trace al-Wangari's life: his education at Sankore, his use of instruments like the astrolabe and quadrant, his corrections to earlier star charts, and his legacy buried in the Mamma Haidara Library. We also explore how…