8vo. Volume I: vii, 410 pp., 4 maps including a frontispiece / Volume II: v, 426 pp., half-titles, contemporary red cloth, biblio, indices, covers lightly soiled with faded spine of volume 1, light foxing to outer edges of volume 2, one small worm hole in upper cover of volume 1 not affecting leaves, previous owner’s inscription on front endpaper of volume 1, otherwise set clean inside & in very good condition, William and Norgate Limited, first edition, 1931-1933.

Synopsis

A presentation copy by author to Bertram Thomas, inscribed and dated May, 1931. Reuben Levy was Professor of Persian at the University of Cambridge, who wrote on Persian literature and Islamic history. His first book, Persian Literature (1923), was written when he was still a lecturer at Oxford. A Baghdad Chronicle (1929) was an account of the Muslim Middle Ages and Abbasid Caliphate. It led to his major work, The Sociology of Islam (2 volumes, 1931–33) (reissued in 1957 as The Social Structure of Islam), which was regarded as a new approach to Muslim history. He also produced translations and critical editions of texts, including the 11th century Persian text Qabus nama (A Mirror for Princes, 1951), The Tales of Marzuban (1959) and The Shah-Nama (1966).