Archaeologist Richards retired from a long teaching and research career at Oxford University in 2000. Former students, colleagues, and others in the profession honor him with essays on Arabic script and the committing of the Qur'an to writing, caliphs and their chroniclers in the Middle Abbasid period, the imprisonment of Reynalf of Chatillon, an original Arabic document from Crusader Antioch in about 1213, tribal feuding and Mamluk faction in medieval Syria, the collapse of the Great Saljuqs, the authenticity of the letter of the descendants of Muhammad b. Salih to the descendants of Mu'awiya b. Salih, materials for studying Arabic in the age of the early printed book, and other topics. There is no subject index. Annotation (c) Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
