Author: Ibn Khaldun
The Muqaddimah, often translated as “Introduction” or “Prolegomenon,” is the most important Islamic history of the premodern world.
Written by the great 14th-century Arab scholar Ibn Khaldun (died 1406), this monumental work established the foundations of several fields of knowledge, including the philosophy of history, sociology, ethnography, and economics.
The first complete English translation by the eminent interpreter of Arabic literature Franz Rosenthal was published in three volumes in 1958 as part of the Bollingen Series and received immediate acclaim in the US and abroad. A one-volume abridged version of Rosenthal’s masterful translation first appeared in 1969.
This Princeton Classics edition of the abridged version includes Rosenthal’s original introduction as well as a contemporary introduction by Bruce B. Lawrence.
This volume makes available a seminal work of Islam and medieval and ancient history to twenty-first century audiences, says a review on the Princeton University Press website.
