The question of which areas of the earth are fit for human habitation and
which ones are not is dealt with in several Hebrew scientific texts of the
twelfth and thirteenth century. Medieval Jewish scholars such as Abraham
bar [Hdotu]iyya, Samuel ibn Tibbon, and the three thirteenth-century Hebrew
encyclopedists were familiar with theories of the oikoumene and its boundaries
through Arabic sources. These Hebrew texts display a variety of views
on the earth's habitability, all of which ultimately go back to antiquity.
Whereas some texts adopted a division of the inhabited portion of the earth
into seven climes, others divided the earth into five zones of temperature, of
which two were habitable and three were not owing to extreme temperatures.
Some of these Jewish authors also pay attention to the question of
how climatological or astrological conditions in a given region influence the
mental constitution of its inhabitants.
BETWEEN SCORCHING HEAT AND FREEZING COLD: MEDIEVAL JEWISH AUTHORS ON THE INHABITED AND UNINHABITED PARTS OF THE EARTH
