Introduction Footnote 8
Macha-allah or Messahala, an Arabian astronomer, by religion a Jew, flourished towards the end of the eighth century.  Latin translations of four of his works (not including the Treatise on the Astrolabe) have been printed, and were published at Nuremberg in 1549.  A list of his works is given in Casiri (Bibl. Arab.-hisp. tom. Ier. pag. 434), and in the Biographie Universelle.