In this extraordinary and powerful book, now available in paperback, Fatima Mernissi, one of the most original and distinctive voices in the Islamic world, uncovers a hidden history of women leaders of Islamic states stretching back over fifteen centuries.

In this extraordinary book, now available in paperback, Fatima Mernissi looks back through fifteen centuries of Islam and uncovers a hidden history of women who have held the reins of state power, but whose lives and stories, achievements and failures, have largely been forgotten.

Mernissi concludes this absorbing historical inquiry by reflecting on its implications for the ways in which politics is practised in the Islamic world today, a world in which women, while generally more educated than their predecessors, are largely excluded from the political domain.