Arab social life in the Middle Ages

the same three categories. Bibliographies of manuscripts cited, edited original sources, and secondary literature complete the volume. The clinical material recorded in Abui al-'Ala' Zuhr's treatise is deplorably short of the type of detail we should like to have. Details of name, background, and occupation are never given, and only occasionally is age or general physical condition stated. The formulation of the entries usually takes the form "he prescribed for someone whose eyelids became swollen when he shouted and his vision grew dark from vapours rising to this head ... (no. 16)", or "for a man in his 70s with a humid body [phlegmatic temperament?] suffering a cold in his head with a headache, phlegm in his stomach, and debilitated, he prescribed ... (no. 314)". Some important questions arise when considering this and similar collections of therapeutic and clinical experiences which were straightforward records of cases and procedures with no discourses on medical theory. Why were they collected (in the case of both Abu al-'Ala' Zuhr and al-Rizi after the death of the author)? What purpose did they serve and who was the intended user of the volume? What subsequent influence did they have on medical practice? Are they to be viewed as precursors of the European Consilia, the collections of anecdotal cases and opinions of famous physicians? Clearly on the basis of the text presented here, historians need to rethink the designation of Kutub al-Mujarrabat. It would seem that medieval medical writers, as well as modem historians, used the term for different types of therapeutic manuals. Perhaps the Kutub al-Khawass ('Books of occult properties') and the Kutub al-Mujarrabat ('Books of experiences') could be viewed as the two ends of a continuum between which there were a range of therapeutic manuals, incorporating to differing degrees therapeutic magic and clinical case histories. This well-documented and carefully prepared translation and edition is a major contribution to our knowledge of the practical aspects of medieval Islamic medical care and should serve as an impetus to examine other preserved medieval Kutub al-Mujarrabat or 'Books of [medical] experiences'. The Maqmndt of the renowned Iraqi litterateur al-Harfri (d. 1122) is a classic of medieval Arabic literature, and after the Qur'an, arguably the greatest masterpiece of the field. It consists of fifty tales that al-HIarifi relates through a narrator named al-H.rith, who in describing his travels and adventures in various parts of the Middle East keeps encountering …