By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 27 June 2025

In 1978, shortly after Patricia Crone and Michael Cook published their book challenging the traditional story of Islam’s origins, Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World, it was reviewed for the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies by John Wansbrough, their mentor and the most important figure in the “Revisionist” movement that arose in Islamic Studies in the 1970s. Wansbrough’s review is reproduced below.