Still older and more widespread was the phenomenon of the 'shadow-play' (khay??l al-???ill),4 an importation from the Far East, mainly China and India, which was carried westward by Muslim merchants and reached as far as Muslim Spain.The earliest accounts of the shadow play date from the eleventh century AD, and the three shadow plays composed by the oculist Ibn D??niy??l (d. 1310) in particular h