SOURCE: George Sale, "The Preliminary Discourse," in Myth and Romanticism: A Collection of the Major Mythographic Sources Used by the English Romantic Poets, edited by Burton Feldman and Robert D. Richardson, Fr., 1734, pp. 56-69.

Sale's translation of the late seventeenth-century Latin translation of the Koran by Luigi Marracci became the standard English version of the holy book at the time and retained that status until about the mid-nineteenth century. The translation is prefaced by a lengthy "Preliminary Discourse," treating the history of Arabia before the time of Muhammad as well as the history of the text's compilation, among other matters. The section of the "Preliminary Discourse" reprinted here discusses the format, language, and style of the Koran.

The word Korân, derived from the verb karaa, to read, signifies properly in Arabic, the reading, or rather, that which ought to be read; by which name the Mohammedans denote...