Historical background of Translation [Archives:2005/854/Culture]
By Sameer A. Haq
Senior Specialist
Office of the Prime Minister
The ancient civilizations such as Mesopotamia, Romans, Greeks, Egypt and others witnessed the need to have a dialogue, conversation and communication to solve the conflicting issues due to clash of cultures in those times. It was important to give a big role to translation process during negotiations, dialogues or discussions that took place between each two conflicting parties. At the beginning translation processes had been verbal through indications, signs, gestures and sounds to express the meaning and approaches intended to convey.
It is very hard to track when man first felt for a need to express his thoughts and ideas in another medium or means. Translation began the moment that people contacted each other through the battles and wars. Ancient Egypt witnessed one of the earliest translation activities in the ancient world, The ” Rosetta Stone “, Rashid stone a black basalt slab bearing an inscription that was the key to the deciphering of Egyptian Hieroglyphics and such findings led to more discoveries of the ancient Pharaohs riddles.
The Greek and Egyptians exchanged philosophy, thoughts and ideas throughout history. The Stone was carved in 196 BC. The Stone shows one of the evidences about existence of translation activities between the Greeks and Egyptians. Another example is ” The Great Library of Alexandria” which was one of the remarkable libraries of the time. The library was the center of knowledge between Asia, Africa and Europe. The library was a bridge between the old and the New World at the time. Mesopotamia witnessed a handful of languages co-existing together in one land and written also using the same Cuneiform writing which made them easy to write and speak in one time.
Old China witnessed deep-rooted civilization so it knew translation activities some 3000 years ago. They transferred their ideas and wisdom into / from their language in a very systematic process. Documents dated back to the Zhou Dynasty 1100BC indicate that translation was implemented by government clerks. Buddhism first originated in India and entered China through translation of its scriptures from Sanskrit into Chinese. During 13th and 7th century of Yuan Dynasty China witnessed once again a special concern towards translation from the west.
Arabs had possessed the Greek and Roman knowledge by means of translation. The Arabs even reached china and translated some works into Arabic. In Bin Battuta was the first Arab traveler to reach China and gave us a full description of the places that he visited in China. A lot of books in astronomy, logic and medicine had been translated into Arabic. The Christian missionaries from the western countries to the Far East and China also witnessed a development of translation activities.
It is significant that each nation had participated somehow in the translation activities and created some new methods in the field of translation. Arabs built their empire and marched the peak of progress after embracing Islam. The Arabs saw that it was significant to bring human knowledge to enforce their growing power. One can observe that ” Beit Al- Hikmah” ( House of wisdom) was one of the knowledge and translation sources for all knowledge seekers. The House contained books in philosophy, math's, logic, astronomy and philosophy.
The Khalif Al Mamun in 830 A. D. established the House of Wisdom and encouraged the translation activities to approach the world more.
It is note worthy to see that the Holy Quran pushed us to learn and gain knowledge to please God. One can notice that the translation movement has grown in the cradle of the three Holy Books, the Old Testament, the New Testament and the Holy Quran. The need to spread and promote the doctrines of those holy religions needed translation of their meanings to all languages of the world. The German Protestant reformer Martin Luther translated the new Testament into German in 1522 and the rest of the Bible in 154. In one way or another Arabic language is very rich in vocabulary and figures of speech so translation is very difficult to the Holy Quran. Only the meaning could be translated for understanding purposes.
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