The religious thinkers‎,‎ political leaders‎,‎ law‎-makers‎,‎ writers and philosophers of the early Muslim world helped to shape the 1‎,‎400‎-year‎-long development of today‎'‎s second‎-largest world religion‎.‎ But who were these people‎?‎ What do we know of their lives‎,‎ and the ways in which they influenced their societies‎?‎ Chase F‎.‎ Robinson draws on the long tradition in Muslim scholarship of commemorating in writing the biographies of notable figures‎,‎ but weaves these ambitious lives together to create a rich narrative of early Islamic civilization‎,‎ from the Prophet Muhammad to fearsome Tamerlane‎.‎ Beginning in Islam‎'‎s heartland‎,‎ Mecca‎,‎ we move across Arabia to follow Islam‎'‎s journey across North Africa‎,‎ as far as Spain in the West‎,‎ and eastwards through Central and East Asia‎;‎ we see the rise and fall of Islamic states through the political and military leaders working to secure peace or expand their power‎,‎ and‎,‎ within this political climate‎,‎ the development of Islamic law‎,‎ scientific thought and literature through the words of the scholars who devoted themselves to these pursuits‎.‎Alongside the famous characters who coloured this landscape‎,‎ including Muhammad‎'‎s controversial cousin‎,‎ ‎'‎Ali‎;‎ the first Sultan of Egypt‎,‎ Saladin‎;‎ and the poet Rumi‎,‎ the reader will also meet less well‎-known figures‎,‎ such as Shajar al‎-Durr‎,‎ slave‎-turned‎-Sultana of Egypt‎,‎ and Ibn Fadlan‎,‎ whose travels in Eurasia brought first‎-hand accounts of the Volka Vikings to the Abbasid Caliph‎.‎