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The study of women in medieval Islamic society is still at a preliminary stage. Gavin R.G. Hambly reconstructs the role of women at court during the lifetime of Babur (1483-1530), whose life spanned the collapse of Timurid rule in Central Asia and the first phase of Mughal rule in India. The sources Hambly investigates, especially Babur's own memoirs, are unusually rich in references to the presence and activities of women in the courts and camps of Babur and his kinsmen. This was a period characterized by a notable florescence in literature and the arts, in which women played a role yet to be determined. Hambly explores this theme, and his work should fill an important gap in our understanding of the role of elite women in traditional Islamic society, a role largely ignored as a result of long established Western stereotypes of women in Islamic society.