Ayicema (a corruption of Ibn Sina), an Arabian physician and philosopher, born in a village of Bokhara in 980, died in 1036 or 1037. He was educated at Bokhara, where he devoted himself to study with such extraordinary zeal that before he reached manhood he was already famous as a physician, and at 21 he had written an encyclopaedia of science to which he gave the name of "Book of the Sum Total." He afterward wrote a series of commentaries on this work, He delivered public lectures on logic and astronomy in the house of a rich patron of learning at Jorjan in Khorasan, and afterward became vizier to the emir of Ilamadan, at whose court he taught philosophy and medicine, closing his lectures every evening with feasting and dancing. Involved after the death of this prince in a secret correspondence with the ruler of Ispahan, he was thrown into prison, but made his escape to that city, and there spent the hitter part of his life in prosperity. Before his death he reformed the excesses of his conduct, freed his slaves, and gave his fortune to the poor.

His medical writings, which number over GO distinct works, were long held in the highest esteem, and the most important of them, the Kanun ("Canon"), was for many centuries the standard authority even in Europe. It gave an excellent synopsis of the views of the ancient Greek physicians. It was published in Latin as early as 1473 (Padua), in Hebrew in 1492 (fol., Naples), and in the original Arabic in 1593 (fol., Rome). There were about 30 Latin editions of the "Canon" during the 15th and 16th centuries. Avicenna's principal philosophical work, the Ash-Shefa, or "Remedy," has never been printed.