In 1401, while besieging the city of Damascus, the Mongol ruler Tamurlane, whose armies had plundered their way from Moscow to Delhi, summoned the scholar Ibn Khaldun. Who better to lay bare for him the secrets of civilisation and political power than the author of that enduring masterpiece of world history The Book of Lessons. History, according to Ibn Khaldun, acquaints us with great figures of the past and allows us to be guided by their example.

The all-conquering Tamurlane was a smart and argumentative man, keen to glean any insights the past could provide. But was he able to predict the triumphant successes that followed, or the later division of his vast empire? Ibn Khaldun, who reminded his readers that victory and superiority in war come from luck and chance - and that no dynasty can expect to last more than four generations - would not have been surprised by either.