Commissioned by the Indian government to prepare a descriptive catalogue of the Arabic manuscripts of the Library of India Office in London, Loth produced this reference work. A total of 1,050 manuscripts are covered in the catalogue. At the time of the composition of Loth’s work only one of the items in the catalogue had even been the subject of an edition which means that the vast majority of the items were unknown until the late 1870s. The texts are divided according to category: Quran, tradition, law, principles of jurisprudence, prayers and charms, scholastic theology, philosophy, Sufism and ethics, biography and history, geography, cosmography, mathematics, astronomy, medicine, poetry, grammar, and dictionaries. For the researcher in Arabic manuscripts, this publication of an important collection should not be missed.

Otto Loth (1844-1881) was Professor Extraordinarius at the University of Leipzig.