At the outset, Tayeb El-Hibri writes that The Abbasid Caliphate: A History grew, in part, from his experiences teaching a course on the Abbasids while he was the visiting Alfred Howell Chair in the History Department at the American University of Beirut. In preparing the course, El-Hibri identified an important gap in the literature on the Abbasid caliphate, the lack of a general survey of Abbasid history that begins with the rise of the dynasty in 750 and ends with its collapse in 1258. Previous surveys have taken a longer purview that places the Abbasids within a larger narrative of the caliphate as a political institution that transcends any single dynasty, or taken a narrower approach, focusing on the “Golden Age” of the Abbasids and ending their story in 861 (the assassination of al-Mutawakkil and the onset of the “Anarchy at Samarra”), 945 (the capture of Baghdad by the Buyids), or 1055 (the capture of Baghdad by the Seljuks). By writing a survey of Abbasid history that fully incorporates the 11th through the 13th centuries, El-Hibri provides an important innovation that emphasizes the continuity of Abbasid power and influence through these later centuries, a period for which many historians have written the caliphs off as ineffectual and impotent puppets and prisoners of more powerful dynasties. In contrast to his predecessors, El-Hibri dedicates one third of the book to these last three centuries of the Abbasid dynasty, focusing on the achievements of the Abbasid caliphs during the period of Buyid and Seljuk domination.

The Abbasid Caliphate is organized chronologically and provides a thorough survey of the major political, religious, economic, intellectual, social, and cultural trends of the 8th through 13th centuries, centering the narrative on Baghdad and the Abbasid dynasty. Chapter 1 presents an overview of the caliphate as an institution in Islamic history, perceptions of the caliphate both within the Islamic world and outside it, and a survey of the sources and major works of modern historiography. El-Hibri gives special attention to material culture here as well, discussing art, architecture, archaeology, and numismatics alongside textual sources and the more traditional historical narratives they produce. Chapter 2 begins with the Abbasid daʿwa or call and revolution and carries through the reign of al-Mansur, covering the establishment of the Abbasid caliphate. This chapter shows the challenge of writing a survey of Abbasid history beginning in 750. El-Hibri must briefly take his readers through the complicated political, religious, and social underpinnings of the Abbasid revolutionary movement—as well as some of the debates about the motivations of the revolutionaries, engaging some deeper aspects of Umayyad politics and the formation of the Alid movement(s)—without letting them overshadow the stars of the book, the Abbasids themselves. Chapter 3 focuses on “the Golden Age of the Abbasid Caliphate,” from the caliphate of al-Mahdi through that of al-Maʾmun. This chapter appropriately muddies the image of a golden age by emphasizing the political nature of medieval historical narrative written primarily after al-Maʾmun's victory and reign, while still exploring the many achievements that mark this period as the height of Abbasid power. Chapter 4 focuses on the period of so-called Abbasid decline, beginning with the construction of an elaborate new capital at Samarra and the jockeying of the Turkic military for power there, followed by the decentralization of the empire under provincial dynasties and the challenge of Shiʿi rivals to the caliphate, before ending with the rise of the Buyids. Rather than a purely downward trajectory, El-Hibri tells the story of the late 9th and early 10th centuries as one of waxing and waning caliphal power, often tied to the economic fortunes of Iraq and the caliph's ability to pay his troops without unduly exploiting the people. Chapter 5 explores how the Abbasids, starting with al-Qadir, redefined their authority in religious terms at the end of the 10th century and into the 11th. Rather than a story of submission to the Seljuk sultan, El-Hibri presents a more symbiotic relationship and portrays the Abbasids as better prepared to take advantage of the changing fortunes of the Seljuk dynasty. This includes the relationships between the caliph and the Khwarazmshahs and other regional powers and the successful reestablishment of an Abbasid state in Iraq at the end of the 12th century. Chapter 6 places the Mongol conquest of the Middle East within the context of a resurgent Abbasid caliphate, one that had successfully reestablished itself in Iraq and western Iran and was building diplomatic ties with other Muslim powers, from North Africa to India. El-Hibri presents the fall of Baghdad and the survival of the Abbasid family in Mamluk Egypt not as the inevitable conclusion for a family who had long been without real power, but the continuation of a dynasty that had successfully positioned itself as uniquely unable to ally with the Mongols while necessary to the further legitimation of the Mamluks. Chapter 7 then concludes with a summary of the major threads that connect five hundred years of Abbasid history, reinforcing the idea that the later centuries cannot stand apart from the Abbasid Golden Age. El-Hibri concludes with the legacies of Abbasid rule stretching down into the 20th century.

In this book, El-Hibri balances an accessible and readable introduction to the Abbasid caliphate with a sophisticated approach to the sources that incorporates major historiographical trends and debates of the last fifty years. Nowhere is this clearer than in his examination of the caliphate of Harun al-Rashid, the rise and fall of the Barmakids, and the civil war between Harun's sons, al-Amin and al-Maʾmun. This discussion, which makes up the majority of Chapter 3, reads very much like a summary of El-Hibri's previous work, Reinterpreting Islamic Historiography, demonstrating how historians of the Abbasid caliphate and the early Islamic period generally should present some of the deeper theoretical and historiographical discussions in the field to a more generalist or novice audience. The affordable paperback and e-book options make this an attractive choice for undergraduate students. The easy readability and minimal scholarly apparatuses mean the book is approachable and well suited for classroom use. Additionally, El-Hibri's rightfully sparse but useful footnotes serve as an overview of the state of the field. As a result, The Abbasid Caliphate is useful not only as an introduction to the Abbasid caliphate and a textbook appropriate for an undergraduate course but also should be required reading for graduate students preparing for their exams or even more experienced scholars who have not explored much past the 9th or 10th centuries. The weaving of contemporary debates into the narrative helps one see how the field of Abbasid history has grown in recent decades.

Any survey with such a broad scope will suffer from some points of oversimplification and perhaps even factual inaccuracy as the author attempts to cover more material than any single person can master. Although I noted nothing that overshadows the overall strengths of the book, anyone specialized in a particular subfield of early Islamic history will find those little trifling moments that give one pause. For me, it was a discussion of the rise of the Samanids during the reign of al-Maʾmun. The author situated the Samanids among the local nobility of Bukhara despite the Samanids’ ancestral home of Saman being somewhere between Tirmidh and Balkh, and Bukhara remaining outside of their authority until 873, forty years after al-Maʾmun's death. In the big picture, this establishes that al-Maʾmun employed local notables to manage distant parts of his vast and diverse empire and that the Samanids were a part of this process, but the fine details may make some readers pause briefly.

A final comment on the format of the book. Beyond the text, the book includes many useful additions, including a chronology, a genealogical chart of the Abbasid caliphs, a glossary, three maps, and thirty-two images. The chronology and glossary are extremely useful for those planning to use this book in the classroom. These are wonderful reference tools for anyone approaching Abbasid history for the first time, which will help students find their bearings. The images, twenty-three black and white and nine in full color, appear as plates in the center of the book and include a mixture of coins, architecture and archaeology, details of architectural decoration, and manuscript pages and illuminations. Unfortunately, many of these images are very small and surrounded by a great deal of blank space, suggesting that they could have been enlarged without adding additional pages to the book. Three maps are situated at the front of the book, including one map showing the overall extent of the Abbasid caliphate at its height, along with its 9th-century neighbors, the provinces of Iraq and Iran (taken from Guy LeStrange), and a focused map of Baghdad (taken from Richard Coke).Footnote ¹ Considering the purposes of the book, it is unfortunate that the maps capture the Abbasid caliphate only in its golden age rather than presenting an evolution of the caliphate into the 10th, 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries. Chapters 4, 5, and 6 would benefit greatly from specialized maps that illustrate the changing nature of the caliphate and the growth of its rivals and successors, especially considering the excellent pedagogical applications possible for the book. Of course, it should be noted that it is not clear if these were choices made by the author or the publisher.