Mind-Benders of Islamic History
Two everyday math words are one man's name and his book title
Around 820 CE the Baghdad scholar al-Khwarizmi wrote a treatise whose Arabic title contained the word "al-jabr" — the root of our word "algebra." When his works were later rendered into Latin, his own name was Latinized as "Algoritmi," which is where the word "algorithm" comes from. Both terms are still in daily use roughly 1,200 years later.
How we know
al-Khwarizmi (c. 780 – c. 850 CE); Al-Jabr (al-Kitāb al-mukhtaṣar fī ḥisāb al-jabr wa'l-muqābala) written c. 820 CE at Baghdad's House of Wisdom; "algebra" from "al-jabr" (Robert of Chester's 1145 Latin translation), "algorithm" from his Latinized name "Algoritmi."
One of many fact-checked wonders across eight traditions at The Spring of Wisdom.