Bibliophiles in Europe at the end of the nineteenth century began to take a serious interest in the manuscripts of the Middle East and the paper on which they were written. Perhaps the most important of these men were C.-M. Briquet working in Geneva, and J. Wiesner and J. von Karabacek working in Vienna. All three were concerned with the burning topic of the moment: Was oriental paper made of cotton? Within the space of two years these three writers published seminal articles for the European study of Arab paper. Das Arabische Papier is one of those articles. The late Don Baker's inspiration...