Edward William Lane's footnotes to The Arabian Nights have long been recognized by Orientalists as the most come picture in existence of Arabian Society - or rather of those Arab, Persian of Greek, but still Mohammedan conditions of life and boundaries of the mental horizon which are generally distinguished by the name of Arabian. These have been collected, edited and presented in this book in a coherent form. To extracts from Arabian historians and other authors of the later Middle Ages, Lane has added the results of his personal experience of Arab society towards the end of the last century. From this blending of record and experience emerges an accurate picture of the Muslim society which remained almost unchanged until the beginning of the 20th century