The earliest surviving copy of this thesis on the Date Palm industry of Iraq, likely the original, presented by the author to Valentine Hugh Wilfred Dowson (1896-1980). The only other known copy is in Arabic, dated 1956, in the Library of Al-Abbas Holy Shrine in Karbala. We can find no trace of this work being published, or record of any other typescript or manuscript copies in English including at the University of Birmingham.

Valentine Dowson was considered an authority on the date palm of Iraq, with his three volume work Dates and date cultivation in the 'Iraq (1921) considered an early fundamental text on cultivation of the date in the twentieth century. Al Dabbagh was a Master of Geography teaching of at the teachers training college in Baghdad, and also produced an English Arabic Dictionary of Geography in 1964.

Dowson was also an Army Intelligence Officer in Iraq from WWI through to the 1950s, and his collection is largely held by King's College London. His wife Margaret Joy Dowson was an accomplished amateur artist who illustrated the covers of several books.

Typescript; small folio (35.5 x 24.5 cm); presentation inscription to contents page, original hole-punched folder with steel ties, manuscript title to upper cover, folder a little frayed with some rust to front title card, very good; [xvii], 115, 41 ff.