Mashad, Khoarassan Razavi prov, May 18, IRNA � Ceremonies to observe Khayyam National Day started in the northeastern city of Nishabur Monday morning.

The city is the birthplace of the great Iranian poet and scientist, Hakim Omar Khayyam who lived 1048-1131.

A number of Iranian scholars and researchers have gathered in the city to commemorate the outstanding figure who stands out in the world as an astronomer, mathematician and a very great poet.

During the ceremonies, a statue of the great poet will be unveiled, too.

Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Ali Jannati is going to address the event.

Khayyam also wrote treatises on mechanics, geography, mineralogy, music, and Islamic theology. He is the author of one of the most important treatises on algebra written before modern times, the Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra (1070). He contributed to a calendar reform.

His significance as a philosopher and teacher, and his few remaining philosophical works, have not received the same attention as his scientific and poetic writings. He taught the philosophy of Avicenna for decades in Nishapur, where Khayy�m was born and buried. His mausoleum there remains a masterpiece of Iranian architecture visited by many people every year.

Outside Iran and Persian-speaking countries, Khayy�m has had an impact on literature and societies through the translation of his works and popularization by other scholars.

In the English-speaking world, Khayyam is well-known through a masterly translation of his poems by the British 19th-century poet and writer Edward Fitzgerald.

By IRNA