Nabil Matar's trilogy on Britain and the Islamic Mediterranean established a new field within British studies and refocused early modernists on the Maghrib and Islamic kingdoms before 1800. Matar has also edited primary materials that reflect back on Britain (and Europe), opening new vistas to those of us without Arabic language training. In his latest book, Europe through Arab Eyes, 1578–1727, familiar events and individuals appear in a new light, like the sultana “Isabell” and the “tyrant” of Qishtala (159). This narrative of Elizabeth I's battle against Philip II and the Armada, and of Islamic and Protestant unity against Catholicism, positions the reader outside the iconic Elizabethan moment. Matar's achievement is in reorienting the reader and passionately engaging with still-current themes.

Matar illuminates the historical context and salient factors in each author's life. A concise chronology of events and rulers provide reference tools. Fresh English translations of foreign language sources appear in part 2, some from Arabic and some from other European languages, all by authors who inhabited and worked in the Arab world, whether of Maghribi (from the “Arab-Islamic West” [5]) or Mashriqi (Levantine) origins and connections. This volume addresses a more specialized audience than his earlier collection (In the Lands of the Christians: Arabic Travel Writing in the Seventeenth Century [New York, 2003]), though advanced undergraduate students would find it accessible and useful. One author's work appears in the earlier compendium, but in different excerpts. The volumes are complementary, although the new one covers a broader range of genres and topics.

The period 1578–1727 “has been ignored by historians of Arabic and Islamic civilizations” since it falls between the glory days of Islamic power and knowledge in the medieval period and the “devastating impact of European imperialism” in the modern era (4). The intervening period manifests “less of a monolithic construction of otherness and more of a diversity of perspectives,” including through the “triangulation of encounters” among religiously, ethnically, and imperially diverse Europeans, Magharibi, and Ottomans (5). Limits on trade with Christendom, nasara violence (expulsion, piracy, sieges), and European expansionist ideology deterred Arab travel to and writing about Christian Europe. Matar claims that only these documents “describe the European imperial age written by contemporaries in their native language” (28), though one wonders if accounts originating in South or East Asia undermine such uniqueness. They do not need, however, to be the “only” of their kind to be valuable resources.

Chapters in part 1 divide along “popular,” defined as personal interactions (including captivity), and “elite” sources, about official travel and embassies. Captivity was a shared experience among travelers and traders in the early modern period, yet Muslims wrote in a “private” fashion whereas Christians wrote publicly, with the example of Christ-like bodily suffering and dramatic turns peppering those European accounts. Stories emphasized the “intelligence and piety of the Muslim captives” (55)—perhaps not so different from some Christian cases. Matar, who has previously published research on female petitioners and captives, includes the words of “Fatma,” a literarily unsophisticated yet emotive writer suffering in Maltese captivity.

On “elite” sources, Matar refers to the subsequent documents in his analysis more frequently. This internal citation is useful for understanding the sources and integrating them into lectures and classroom discussion. An extended comparison of Ahmad ibn Qasim and Fakhr al-Dīn shows that “flexible” attitudes toward the Europeans “were products of historical interaction, cooperation, and encounter, and went beyond fixedness of belief” (82). Ambassadors formed opinions of and interacted with European women, avoiding physical intimacy, even if turning instead to slave women brought with them to Europe. Arabic-speaking and Arabic-writing ambassadors knew European languages and thus the “Affairs of Europe” (77), explaining the establishment of Oxbridge chairs in Arabic and the collection of Arabic (and Persian) language books for British libraries. Other knowledge gaps were significant and, for learned writers and ambassadors, part of the painful contrast between illustrious past and unstable present.

“Decline” (119–20) is troublesome when cultures do not esteem material gain or technological advance equally. The sources' melancholy undercurrent points to stasis in Islamic scientific and cultural knowledge and decline in diplomatic and military power over this “long” seventeenth century. In contrast, Europeans embraced dynamism, innovation, and territorial expansion. Thus, some writers shared weapons and engineering technology. Force rather than a knowledge gap tipped the balance, however. European bombardment of port cities and the “exclusionary nationalism that was developing in Europe” (133) cemented the divergence between the Arab-Islamic and European Christian worlds, creating the “polarization that eventually launched the armies of European empire” (135).

The sources present microhistory, a “multi-vocal narrative, a ‘montage of fragments’” rather than the “grand narratives” of macrohistory (18–19). They appear in chronological order of content, not composition, and are not separated between “popular” and “elite.” Included are pleas to redeem captives, captives' words, descriptions of sieges and bombardments, and reactions to Muslims' expulsions from Iberia. Warnings about the sea, piracy, and depredations of unscrupulous people appear in these “fragments.” Travel through European and North African countries brings praise for beautiful buildings; descriptions of landscape and geography; and commentary on economic, cultural, and political practices.

The “Western tradition,” Matar argues, would not normally consult “memories and prayers, exegetical reflections and short exempla, commemorative verses and ballads,” or “anecdotes and jokes, food recipes and medical advice” contained therein (19). Matar refers to Carlo Ginzburg's study of the famous miller Menocchio, as did Stuart Schwartz (All Can Be Saved: Religious Tolerance and Salvation in the Iberian Atlantic World [New Haven, CT, 2008]). This historiographical example illuminates the “quiet” of tolerance in an age of noisy persecution and imagines the intellectual and cultural world within and parallel to Western print culture and archival sources. Schwartz's reliance on anecdote and proverbial phrases in Inquisition records, for instance, suggests lessening dependence on an exclusive “Western tradition.” These evocative and provocative translations from an important moment in the history of Arab-Islamic and European relations will enable increasingly fine-grained comparisons. Matar continues to challenge and reshape early modern studies.