[1] All the estimates, presented in the book section by section, are based on data collected while the war in the East was in progress, and the killing of Jews by means of carbon monoxide gas during Operation Reinhard – launched in 1942 to implement the "Final Solution" – had only begun.

The Black Book is a collection of authenticated documents, depositions, eye-witness accounts, and Ministerial summaries, describing and illustrating with photographs, the Nazi crimes against the Polish nation and War crimes in occupied Poland during World War II committed in mere two years: including massacres, tortures, expulsions, forced colonization, persecution, destruction of culture, and humiliation of a nation.

[1] The book is a sequel to The German Invasion of Poland compiled by the Polish government-in-exile and published in 1940,[1] sometimes considered as the first volume of this publication series.

The original volume deals with the war crimes of the September 1939 invasion of Poland.

[3] The Black Book is composed of nine sections, preceded by an Introduction titled 'Hora Tenebrarum'.