Muslim and Christian Contact in the Middle Ages: A Reader is an anthology of medieval primary sources and excerpts that illustrate diverse forms of interaction between Western Christians and Muslims and demonstrate conceptions of the other held by members of each group. Although a few entries date from the earlier centuries of Islam, the period from circa 1000–1500 forms “the chronological core” of the book (xiii). Geographically speaking they range from Spain to Bagdad, from Northern Europe to Egypt and North Africa.

The editor, Jarbel Rodriguez, organizes the volume topically. After a three-page introduction tracing the history of Islamic and Christian interactions during the Middle Ages, he begins his presentation of the primary sources with a chapter entitled “Origins and Background to Christian/Islamic Interactions,” followed by chapters on warfare (one on the Eastern and one on the Western Mediterranean), diplomacy and alliances, economic relations, religious interactions, views of the other, lives of minority communities, and intellectual contacts. Rodriguez ends with “Of Love and Bondage,” a chapter whose sources address inter-religious romance and slavery, issues often closely connected in the period under discussion.

Each chapter is subdivided into smaller topics, some comprising a single source. Other times Rodriguez includes multiple sources under one subtopic, such as “The Calling of the Crusades” in chapter two, which contains three sources. As a result, although the table of contents lists eighty-nine subtopics, the book contains one hundred and thirteen primary sources, often enabling readers to observe a phenomenon from several perspectives. Especially valuable are instances in which Rodriguez includes sources from both Christian and Muslim authors that address the same issue, such as accounts of the peace negotiations between Richard the Lionheart and Saladin (70–79) or multiple descriptions of El Cid (133–144).

Authorship of primary sources is divided fairly equally between Muslims (48) and Christians (62), with two sources in which the religion of the author is unclear and one in which the author is Jewish. Most sources are the products of government and other cultural elites, although some merchant documents and travel accounts are also included. None are written by women.

The chronological span of the translations runs from 1848 to the present. Rodriguez has revised and updated the language of eighteen of the earliest among them. Twenty sources are his own translations. The remainder are compiled from a broad range of modern printed works. The length of the sources varies from one to ten pages, most running three or four. Each source or sub-topic receives an introductory paragraph that provides some or all of the following information: author, title, date, context in which the work was composed, topic that it addresses, and often some broader contextual background.

Rodriguez also includes twelve figures, some merely illustrating a place or event described in the sources, such as the representation of the Crac des Chevaliers (104). Others, such as the late medieval Christian woodcut of the Turkish potentate, Mehmed II on his deathbed complete with the devil carrying off his soul (283), allow for deeper insight into social and cultural attitudes of the other.

The types of sources contained in the anthology are as diverse as the topics they address and include excerpts from law codes, chronicle entries, literary works, sermons, travel accounts, and intellectual treatises. Their variety is impressive and the volume certainly recommends itself as a sourcebook for any course designed as an overview of Muslim/Christian relations during this period. The volume's content pushes past any superficial notions of monolithic enmity between Western Christians and Muslims during the Middle Ages, demonstrating that, in addition to conflict, various forms of toleration, and even amity, were achieved under certain circumstances. The interactions between members of these groups, the interconnectedness of the Islamic and Western Christian worlds, and the intellectual and social cross-pollination between these societies and cultures are on full display. A brief topical index (439–440) allows the possibility of using the volume for further research.

When considering this volume for use in a college-level history course, the following observations may help further describe its utility. The work is not designed to serve as a stand-alone textbook. The introduction is too cursory, the chronological and geographic spread of the sources is too broad to function without lectures or secondary materials to provide broader context. Because it is arranged topically it would also be difficult to employ the volume to examine closely Christian/Muslim contact in a specific region or period, although one could certainly pick and choose entries to obtain a more limited focus, as Rodriguez himself suggests in his “Introduction” (xiii). But if the goal of the course were to examine a more specific focal point, such as medieval Spain for example, a number of other readers exist that have a more restricted emphasis. The purpose of Rodriguez's anthology is really to provide thematic overviews, something it achieves admirably.

Related to this point, however, is my one criticism of the volume. Rodriguez's emphasis on topic seems to have led occasionally to inattention to historical detail that should be present in any scholarly history text. This imprecision reveals itself sporadically in his introductions to the sources. Most are effective in orienting the reader to the work's origin and context. But intermittently Rodriguez fails to include the author's name, the location in which the text was composed, and the approximate date of its composition, as occurs in his introduction to “The Conquest of Alexandria” (4–5) and in a description of an incident that occurred among the dhimmi of Cairo in 1301 (336). The reader is left to guess whether the sources are eyewitness accounts or later historical interpretations. Sometimes Rodriguez names the author, but provides no further information with the result that the reader cannot situate him intellectually, politically, or socially, as in an excerpt from the author Ibn al-Qalanisi who provides an account of the popular Muslim reaction to the First Crusade (67) or the report on the situation in Sicily in 1185 by Ibn Jubayr (321). These are not household names. Including a phrase or two of biographical information would have been useful. Occasionally Rodriguez merely fails provide the date when the work was composed, as in the case of Ludolph von Suchem's travel account describing Damascus's main market (234). But such information is vital, especially in a case like this where the text is helpfully paired with Pedro Tafur's description from the 1430s of Cairo's main market. The reader is left wondering whether the two accounts are contemporary or centuries apart. Perhaps in some of these cases the relevant information is lost, but this should be noted. Such omissions add unnecessary complexity to any effort to interpret a source and they set a poor example for students. They do not, however, invalidate the overall usefulness of the volume which, in the final analysis, provides a rich array of varied interactions between Christians and Muslims and diverse views of the other from an important period of history.