This cohesive volume offers a comprehensive yet highly readable introduction to the ‘medieval’ history of Ethiopia and Eritrea, covering a broad range of subjects from the seventh to the mid-sixteenth centuries. The editor, Samantha Kelly, has brought together more than a dozen leading scholars, international experts in their respective fields, whose articles explore the religious, political and cultural history of the Christian, Muslim and local-religious realms of the North-East African highland plateau and adjacent areas, as well as the history of women, diasporas and trade in and out of the region. Kelly’s introduction clearly sketches out the aims and content of the volume; it introduces the reader to the region’s specific historical and historiographical terminology and draws attention to several threads running through the book, among them the centrality of the region’s links with the eastern Mediterranean and the Red Sea area. The very first chapter, by Marie-Laure Derat, casts the history of the Christian kingdom(s) in the post-Aksumite and Zagwe eras, and thus the seventh to late thirteenth centuries, in an entirely new light, significantly revising long-held scholarship beliefs on the ethnic identity, territorial anchorage and even chronology of Zagwe rule. Deresse Ayenachew subsequently traces the territorial and political expansion of the Solomonic dynasty from 1270 CE to the mid-sixteenth century, delineating the development and adaption of the Christian kingdom’s administrative structure, and how the evolution of courtly and military offices enabled the Solomonic kings to govern their highly diverse and geographically challenging realm. Amélie Chekroun and Bertrand Hirsch contribute two chapters to the volume: the first, on the Sultanates of medieval Ethiopia, combines the findings of recent archaeological research with new readings of textual sources. It offers a cohesive view of the Islamic history of the region between the ninth and sixteenth centuries, tracing two different axes of Islamisation, shedding light on the different polities’ political organisation, and their conflicts and connections with their Christian neighbours. François-Xavier Fauvelle, meanwhile, uses recent archaeological findings to shine a light onto the political and economic history of the local-religious societies that resisted conversion to monotheistic faiths, from the regions of Šäwa to Damot.