Ockley, Simon. The History of the Saracens; comprising the Lives of Mohammed and his Successors, to the Death of Abdalmelik, the eleventh caliph. With an account of their most remarkable Battles, Sieges, Revolts, &c. Collected from authentic sources, especially Arabic MSS. London: Henry G. Bohn, 1848. The Fifth Edition, Revised, Improved, and Enlarged. [12519]
Publisher's teal blindstamped cloth, gilt titles to spine, a little edge-wear, binding is clean, 7 1/2 x 5 inches. The front end paper hinge is torn, the rear one partly so, making the binding a bit wobbly. Fine steel engraved portrait of Mohammed with tissue guard as frontispiece. xxviii, 512 clean pp.; a bit shaken, the book is unopened after p. 273. Fair. Hardcover.
Bohn's Standard Library series.
"Upon its first publication this work was received by scholars with marked approbation, as the most complete and authentic account of the Arabian Prophet and his successors which had yet been given to the world; and even at the present day, after the lapse of nearly a century, it continues to be regarded as the standard history of this eventful period. The establishment of Islamism is undoubtedly to be numbered among those stupendous events which have changed the face of society in the East; and is a subject deserving not only of the careful study of the statesman and the divine, but of all who delight to search, patiently and reverently, into the ways of Providence. With the Koran in one hand, and the scimitar in the other, the impetuous and indomitable Arab achieved a series of splendid victories unparalleled in the history of nations; for in the short space of eighty years that mighty range of Saracenic conquest embraced a wider extent of territory than Rome had mastered in the course of eight hundred." - Advertisement.
Simon Ockley (c. 1678-1720), b. Exeter, England; d. Swavesey, England. He was educated at Cambridge, mastered the Middle Eastern languages, and became Hebrew Lecturer in the college. He took holy orders and was made vicar of Swavesey Parish, where he remained for the rest of his life. He was said to be the most proficient translator of Arabic into English in his day, and he excelled in scholarship and enthusiasm for the language and history of the Arabs. His "History of the Saracens" is his most important production.
"The work is based upon a manuscript in the Bodleian Library ascribed to the Arabic historian El-Wakidi...although many of its details require correction, the importance of Ockley's work in relation to the progress of oriental studies cannot be overestimated...Ockley for the first time made the history of the early Saracen conquests attractive to the general reader, and stimulated the student to further research." - Stanley Lane-Poole, Dictionary of National Biography (1885-1890).
