Bukhtishu

The Bukhtīshūʿ (or Boḵtīšūʿ) were a family of either Persian or Syrian Eastern Christian physicians from the seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries, spanning six generations and 250 years. The Middle Persian-Syriac name which can be found as early as at the beginning of the 5th century refers to the eponymous ancestor of this "Syro-Persian Nestorian family". Some members of the family served as the personal physicians of Caliphs. Jurjis son of Bukht-Yishu was awarded 10,000 dinars by al-Mansur after attending to his malady in 765AD. It is even said that one of the members of this family was received as physician to Ali ibn Husayn Zayn al-Abidin, the Shia Imam, during his illness in the events of Karbala. Like most physicians in the early Abbasid courts, they came from the Academy of Gondishapur in what is now southwest Iran. They were well versed in the Greek and Indian sciences, including those of Plato, Aristotle, Pythagoras, and Galen, which they aided in translating while working in Gondishapur. In the course of their integration into the changing society after the Muslim conquest of Persia, the family acquired Arabic while preserving Persian as oral language for about 200 years. The family was originally from Ahvaz, near Gondeshapur, however they eventually moved to the city of Baghdad and later on to Nsibin in Syria. Yahya ibn Khalid, the vizier and mentor to Harun al-Rashid, provided patronage to the Hospital and Academy of Gondeshapur and helped assure the promotion and growth of astronomy, medicine and philosophy, not only in Persia but also in the Abbasid Empire in general.