Although born in Australia, the historian and folklorist Joseph Jacobs (1854–1916) spent his adult years in England and America. Educated at Cambridge and Berlin, he came to public attention in 1882 following the publication in The Times of a series of articles on the persecution of Jews in Russia that had followed the assassination of Alexander II. The Mansion House Committee to aid the Jews of Russia was established as a result of these articles. In 1885 he published this book, listing all the printed works on the 'Jewish Question' that had appeared in the previous decade. It is notable that those items originating in Germany form the bulk of the bibliography, providing as much material as all other countries combined. Revealing in its scope, this has been described as the most important contemporary bibliography on the subject.