Eléments biographiques
William Muir étudia à l’Académie Kilmarnock, à Glasgow et à l’Université d’Edimbourg ainsi qu’à Haileybury College. Entre 1837 et 1885, il eut de haute responsabilité dans l’administration du gouvernement des Indes. En 1885, il fut élu principal de l’Université d’Édimbourg en succédant à Sir Alexander Grant, et occupa ce poste jusqu’en 1903, date où il prit sa retraite.
Sélection bibliographique
– The life of Mahomet, with introductory chapters on the original sources for the biography of Mahomet, and on the pre-Islamite history of Arabia, vol I, II, III, IV
– The life of Mahomet : vol. III : with introductory chapters on the original sources for the biography of Mahomet, and on the pre-islamite history of Arabia, Biblio Verlag, 1988.
– The Mohammedan controversy ; Biographies of Mohammed ; Sprenger on tradition ; The Indian liturgy ; and, The Psalter, T. & T. Clark, 1897.
– The Caliphate, its rise, decline and fall ..., 2nd ed., The religious tract society, 1891.
– Mahomet and Islam, The Religious Tract Society, 1887.
– Extracts from the Coran in the original : with English rendering, 2d ed., Trübner & Co., 1885
– Annals of the Early Caliphate, from originals sources, Smith Elder, 1883.
– The early Caliphate and rise of Islam, Smith, Elder & Co., 1881.
– The Corân: its composition and teaching, and the testimony it bears to the Holy Scriptures, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge : Pott, Young & Co., 1878.
– The life of Mahomet and history of Islam to the era of the Hegira : with introductory chapters on the original sources for the biography of Mahomet and on the pre-Islamite history of Arabia, Smith, Elder, 1858.
– The testimony borne by the Coran to the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, Agra Religious Tract and Book Society, Agra, India / Printed at the Secundra Orphan Press, 1856
– The aborigines and early commerce of Arabia, 1853.