The calligraphic design above says "bab-e avval," or "First Part." It was most generously created by Adil Mansuri of New Jersey as one of *a set of chapter dividers for the book*.

*Prefatory material*
*Chapter One: History, Faith, Politics: Origin Myths of Urdu and Hindi*
    [see below for both Urdu and Hindi translations of Chapter One]
*Chapter Two: Remaking History, Refashioning Culture*
*Chapter Three: Beginning, Then Going Away from Home*
*Chapter Four: The Birth of Literary Theory*
*Chapter Five: A True Beginning in the North*
*Chapter Six: A Phenomenon called Vali*
*Chapter Seven: The 'New' Literary Culture*
*Bibliography*
*Index*

This book is more or less an English version of the author's earlier Urdu work, Urdu ka ibtida'i zamanah: adabi tahzib o tarikh ke pahlu (Karachi: Aj Ki Kitaben, 1999). The two are not identical, however. The author was able to add some new material at various points in the English version. Original texts appear in the Urdu version, of which only translations appear in the English one. Here is *Chapter One in the Urdu version*; also Chapters *Two*, *Three*, *Four*, *Five*, *Six*, *Seven*, *bibliography*, *index*.

Because of this book's popularity, it was also brought out in a Hindi edition: Urdu ka arambhik yug (New Delhi: Rajkamal Prakashan, 2007). Here is *Chapter One in the Hindi version*.