There seems to be growing interest in what John Tolan aptly calls the “European Muhammad”: not the historical figure who lived in and transformed early-seventh-century Arabia but rather “a mirror for European writers, expressing their fears, hopes, and ambitions.” Julian Yolles and Jessica Weiss enrich this field by providing ready access to narrative accounts of Muhammad’s life and, crucially, making these texts available not only in Latin but also in accurate and highly readable English translations.
Medieval Latin Lives of Muhammad contains nine works, organized in roughly chronological order with text and translation on facing pages to facilitate comparison. Seven of these works were composed in Latin, while two are mediaeval Latin translations of Eastern Christian texts.
I would strongly encourage university libraries of all types to include this volume in their collections, as it makes important works available for undergraduate research. It will be indispensable for all future scholarship related to the European Muhammad, and I personally found it quite helpful when preparing my own work on this subject.
David M. Freidenreich
Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations
