This brief history of the Arabs from the pre-Islamic era to the present provides readers with an outstanding, easily comprehensible overview of a world that has been subject to many half-truths and prejudices. Halm's expertise extends to both political and social developments and the cultural sphere. It accomplishes the considerable feat of providing a lucid and compact depiction of the long history of the Arabs. There is a wealth of interesting material on the social and cultural history, for instance on Muslim-Christian relations and on the influence of Arab-Islamic scholarship on the West.