Timbuktu is the legendary city founded as a commercial center in West Africa 900 years ago. Today this city in present-day Mali is synonymous with the phrase "utterly remote," but this was not always so. For more than 600 years, Timbuktu was a significant religious, cultural and commercial center whose residents traveled throughout Asia, Africa and Europe. Timbuktu was famous for educating important scholars who were well known throughout the Islamic world. Many individuals traveled to the city to acquire knowledge; others came to acquire wealth and political power. |
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Situated on the edge of the Sahara Desert, Timbuktu was famous among the merchants of the Mediterranean basin as a market for obtaining the goods and products of Africa south of the desert. However, Timbuktu's most famous and long-lasting contribution to Islamic and world civilization is the scholarship practiced there. By at least the 14th century, important books were written and copied there, establishing the city as the center of a significant written tradition in Africa. As part of its mission to create a universal collection of recorded knowledge from all geographic areas and all historical eras, the Library of Congress is particularly proud to have the opportunity to exhibit these important cultural artifacts from Mali in the exhibition "Ancient Manuscripts from the Desert Libraries of Timbuktu." You can see these rare manuscripts in the Library's Jefferson Building until Sept. 3. They are on loan from the Mamma Haidara Commemorative Library and the Library of Cheick Zayni Baye of Boujbeha, two of the most noteworthy institutions in the Timbuktu area. The Library is also pleased that copies of these manuscripts will be deposited in its collections and will be available for use by researchers and scholars. This exhibition was planned in conjunction with the Smithsonian Institution's National Folklife Festival. A current map of Mali from the Geography and Map Division is also part of this exhibition. "Tombouctou," as it is called on this map, is on the Niger River in the center of this landlocked nation. |
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