H. A. R. (Hamilton Alexander Rosskeen) Gibb

Born in Alexandria, Egypt, in 1895, H. A. R. Gibb was educated in Scotland and went on to become one of the best-known British scholars of Arabic and Islamic civilization in the 20th century. He taught at the School of Oriental Studies in London and later served as Laudian Professor of Arabic at the University of Oxford.

In 1955 he moved to Harvard, where he became Jewett Professor of Arabic and University Professor. There he helped strengthen Islamic studies and encouraged a broader, interdisciplinary approach that connected language and philology with history, literature, and society.

Gibb wrote widely on Islamic history, thought, and culture. Among the works associated with him are studies of the Arab conquests, Ibn Khaldun, modern trends in Islam, and Saladin. He died in 1971, but he remains an important figure in the development of Islamic and Middle Eastern studies.