Educated in Prague, Vienna and Leipzig, Moritz Steinschneider (1816–1907) was a Jewish Bohemian orientalist with a deep understanding of classical and Semitic languages and cultures, specialising in bibliography. He edited twenty-one volumes of the journal Hebräische Bibliographie from 1859 to 1882, and his 1878 catalogue of the Hebrew manuscripts held in the Hamburg State Library is also reissued in this series, along with his 1877 review of Arabic polemic and apologetic literature among Muslims, Christians and Jews. Published between 1878 and 1897, this two-volume work is a descriptive catalogue of the Hebrew manuscripts in what is now the Berlin State Library. Volume 2 is structured thematically, describing 135 manuscripts and focusing on the Hebrew Bible. It also addresses poetry as well as mathematics, medicine, magic and the Kabbalah.