The idea for this book first emerged more than ten years ago in a conversation with my friend Amy Singer, but for a long time it remained a mere diversion from other research and teaching. I am deeply grateful to the European University Institute in Florence, where I spent the fall of 2016 as a Fernand Braudel Fellow, for allowing me to finally turn the idea into the first pages of a manuscript. Further support in Prague was provided by the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at Charles Universityâs Faculty of Arts and by Pavel Sládek, chair of the department. I am indebted to Belinda Davis, Pieter Judson, Petr KuÄera, Christoph Neumann, and Michal Pullmann for their valuable advice on the conception of the book and their comments on some of its chapters. I would also like to thank the staff of the National Library in Prague and Jakub Rumpl, Librarian of the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at the Faculty of Arts in Prague, for their professional help, Martina Kutková for editorial assistance, and Robin Cassling for her patient and inspired editing of the manuscript. Finally, I owe enormous thanks to my son Abraham for bearing with me while I was working on the book instead of cooking or going out with him.