http://www.amusingplanet.com/2016/02/the-forgotten-desert-libraries-of.html The Forgotten Desert Libraries of Chinguetti Kaushik Saturday, February 20, 2016 1 comment The ancient desert town of Chinguetti, in Mauritania, on the western edge of the Sahara, has changed little since it was founded more than twelve centuries ago. The houses are still built of reddish dry-stone and mud, with flat roofs made of timber panels from palm trees. The stone walls are punctured with tiny windows and hand-hewn doors cut from massive ancient acacia trees, which have long disappeared from the surrounding area. Many of these houses now lie in ruins, abandoned by their owners to escape the encroaching sand of the vast Sahara. Once a thriving metropolis of 200,000, Chinguetti now has only a few thousand residents left. As the town slowly disappears under the sand, some of the last remaining families cling desperately to their precious treasure — one of the finest collection of ancient Islamic manuscripts. libraries-chinguetti-7 Photo credit: Michal Huniewicz Located at the crossroads of several trade routes through the Sahara, Chinguetti became an important trading center by the 11th century. Desert caravans would use the city as an oasis, stopping to peddle their wares and let the thousands of camels take rest. Later, it became a gathering place for pilgrims on their way to Mecca. As thousands of learned men passed through this place, exchange of religious and scientific ideas took place and the reputation of the small city flourished. What was once just a stopover point quickly became a destination in its own right. For centuries, people from all over West Africa travelled to Chinguetti to study religion as well as law, astronomy, mathematics, and medicine. Half a century ago, there were said to be 30 libraries with ancient leader-bound volumes and thousands of manuscripts. Now only five survive. These private libraries are watched over by the same families who’ve been passing down their literary treasures for generations. Lying in open shelves in the harsh desert climate, these precious artifacts are slowly crumbling away to dust. The government of Mauritania has been attempting to acquire these delicate manuscripts from their keepers so that they could be preserved, but the families refuse to part with their legacy. It’s an honor to keep them. "Would you part with your hand or your foot? It is a part of us," says Seif Islam, the manager of the local secondary school, who has 700 dusty volumes in his collection. These librarians, however, will eagerly show their collection to any tourist curious enough to see them. It is estimated that there are 33,000 ancient texts in the country, but only a couple thousand have been properly cleaned and archived in the National Museum.? libraries-chinguetti-5 Photo credit: Michal Huniewicz libraries-chinguetti-6 Photo credit: Michal Huniewicz libraries-chinguetti-9 Photo credit: Michal Huniewicz libraries-chinguetti-10 Photo credit: Michal Huniewicz libraries-chinguetti-1 Photo credit: Christophe André/Flickr libraries-chinguetti-2 Photo credit: Christophe André/Flickr libraries-chinguetti-3 An ancient Quran. Photo credit: Ammar Hassan/Flickr libraries-chinguetti-4 Photo credit: Ammar Hassan/Flickr libraries-chinguetti-11 A thousand year old Quran. Photo credit: Paul Williams Sources: The Guardian / The Daily Beast / Wikipedia ========================== http://www.messynessychic.com/2014/05/14/the-lost-desert-libraries-of-chinguetti/ The Lost Desert Libraries of Chinguetti By MessyNessy 14TH MAY, 2014 9 martinhulle-chinguetti The sands of the Sahara have all but swallowed Chinguetti, a near ghost town found at the end of a harsh desert road in Mauritania, West Africa. Its majority of abandoned houses are open to the elements, lost to the dunes of a desert aggressively expanding southward at a rate of 30 miles per year. While predictions suggest this isolated town will be buried without a trace within generations, Chinguetti is probably the last place on Earth you would look for a library of rare books. (c) lead image by Martin Hülle chinguetti1 (c) Groundhopping Merseburg Chinguetti-MartinHulle (c) Martin Hülle spooner (c) John Spooner This was once a prosperous medieval metropolis, home to 20,000 residents and a centre for scholars of science, religion, law, medicine, mathematics and astronomy in West Africa. A principal gathering place for pilgrims on their way to Mecca, it even became known as a holy city in its own right and over time, it was recognised as the seventh holy city of Islam, the “City of Libraries”. jasonfinch (c) Jason Finch Today all that remains of the scholarly and holy city is a collection of deserted streets and mud houses left behind by the Moorish Empire with a few signs scrawled above doorways… chinguetti-groundhopping (c) Groundhopping Merseburg seetheworld (c) See the World pics jielle But against all odds, behind these walls sleep 6,000 books, some kept (for the most part) in tact since the 9th century in the dry desert air… jasonfinch-chinguetti (c) Jason Finch ibiss-chinguettilibrary (c) Ibiss As recently as the 1950s, Chinguetti was home to an impressive thirty family-owned libraries, but severe drought saw the town’s residents disappear, taking their books passed down from generations with them. Today there remains less than ten libraries in the old town, catering to scholars that occasionally visit the isolated town, but mostly to tourists who pass through to see the priceless texts and experience a traditional nomadic hospitality of the Mauritanian desert. chinguettinight (c) Smithsonian Among some of the world’s most important Islamic manuscripts on religion, science and literature, the books are written on gazelle skin and protected by goatskin. The wealthiest library, which houses the most important collection in the old quarter and is considered one of the oldest libraries of Islam, is owned by the Mohammed Habbot family. The 1,600 books in this collection are stored in iron cabinets and despite its unlikely location, the library somewhat resembles a traditional library, with administrative filing cabinets and reading desks. chinguettilibrary2 (c) Abec Photographe The other handful of libraries still surviving in Chinguetti however are very much time capsules of the medieval era in which they were first built, storing the ancient books in simple cardboard binders on open shelving, vulnerable to the elements. Just about the worst environment for storing ancient books, Chinguetti is an unfortunate victim of climate change that is causing seasonal flash flooding and severe erosion as well as increased desertification and frequent sandstorms. chinguetti-finch (c) Jason Finch chinguettilibrary2 source The best hope of preventing the deterioration of these priceless books would be to limit their contact with light and dust. But for the few remaining residents of Chinguetti, tourism is their livelihood and the nomadic librarians are obliged to expose the ancient texts to show to passing tourists, spoiling them a little more everyday. chinguettibooks source Recognising the endangered status of the city, UNESCO has designated Chinguetti a World Heritage Site. Cave paintings from the Stone Age found near Chinguetti, depict the region as a lush grassland where wildlife once flourished. However, delaying the effects of climate change would require a sustained commitment using highly advanced technology, and with the current political turmoil plaguing West Africa, the fate of Chinguetti’s libraries looks about as promising as that of our own independent bookshops. ==================== http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-libraries-of-chinguetti The Libraries of Chinguetti Five ancient libraries nearly unchanged since medieval times are slowly being eaten by the desert EDIT PLACE BEEN HERE? 2 WANT TO VISIT? 34 A handwritten Quranic text. CARLOS REIS ON FLICKR (CREATIVE COMMONS) Resting in the midst of the harsh Mauritanian desert, the stark city of Chinguetti contains some of the world's most important Quranic texts amidst its simple earthen libraries. Related Places The Gennadius Library ATHINA, GREECE The Gennadius Library 37.9797, 23.7483 The pictograph thought to represent legendary Chiefs Gadao & Malaguaña INARAJAN, GUAM Gadao's Cave 13.2769, 144.7532 Originally established in 777 CE, Chinguetti became an important trading city in the region as one of the few outposts in the desert. It also became a gathering place for Islamic pilgrims on their way to Mecca. With the steady traffic of holy people through the city, a large, unadorned mosque was built and small libraries were built to contain the growing number of religious texts left behind. Sticking to the original tradition of trading and passing down such holy writings, most of the original Chinguetti libraries exist in largely the same state as when they were founded. Today there are five such libraries left in Chinguetti containing some 1,300 Quranic manuscripts. The crumbling texts are gingerly handled by scholars who still occasionally visit the site to debate Islamic Law. Unfortunately Chinguetti is suffering from the aggressive expansion of the Saharan desert surrounding it and these historically significant texts are in great danger of being destroyed by the dry air and shifting sands. Preservationists have attempted to relocate the collections or set up restoration programs locally, but the private owners of the libraries refuse to let the texts leave the succession of being passed down and traded amongst themselves. UNSECO has marked the city of Chinguetti and other ancient settlements nearby as World Heritage sites, and efforts are being made to save the city and its libraries from desertification. Unfortunately local political turmoil has made it hard to focus on such projects. With luck Chinguetti will not finally succumb to the sands of time. ================ http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/09/11/the-lost-libraries-of-the-sahara.html The Lost Libraries of the Sahara? A once-bustling center of learning in the middle of the Sahara Desert is now a dry, sparsely populated town trying valiantly to save its ancient, extraordinary libraries. In a mud-and-brick town that blends in with the rusty red sand of the vast Sahara, generations of families have been guarding ancient books—some perhaps 1,000 years old—and with them, the reputation of a once-legendary, enlightened city. These libraries—mostly simple, mud-packed shelves stacked high with bound manuscripts in ancient huts—are what remain of a place that in better times was the epicenter of Islamic learning and medieval trading in northern Africa. In Mauritania, Chinguetti once flourished with scholars, pilgrims, and religious leaders. But today, the few thousand people left have been fighting against the harsh desert to maintain control of their precious artifacts.? The remaining 10 or so libraries hold frayed remains of ancient books on Quranic studies, science, and law. They’re tended to by the same families who’ve been passing down their literary treasures for generations. Some hold just a few shelves and boxes of manuscripts, but one contains an organized collection of 1,400 texts. Actor and explorer Michael Palin, visiting in 2001, described one elderly bookkeeper showing off his priceless wares. “In some cases the pages have come loose from their bindings, but in all of them the quality of the work is exquisite. They have been in his family for centuries and he treats the texts like old friends, moving his finger from right to left, as the Chinese and Japanese do, across the delicate, spidery calligraphy.”? Chinguetti was founded in the 12th century to serve as a resting point for the Saharan trade routes crisscrossing present-day Morocco, Mauritania, and Mali. Desert caravans would use the city as an oasis, stopping to peddle their wares and let the thousands of camels in their trains rest. Since the 13th century, Sunni devotes have been traveling to Chinguetti on their way to Mecca. A stone mosque built not long after the city became a well-trodden passageway still stands as a central attraction in the town. What was once just a stopover point quickly became a destination in its own right. As the small city’s reputation flourished, particularly between the 1600s and 1800s, it became known as a pillar of religious scholarship and was considered one of Islam’s holiest cities.? But the desert has been creeping up on Chinguetti. Half a century ago, there were said to be 30 libraries and 20,000 inhabitants. Today, only as many as 10 book troves remain and the population numbers a couple thousand. In the 1970s, new mines constructed nearby pulled away the town’s inhabitants, and, soon after, the 16-year Western Sahara War broke out, forcing more Chinguettis from their homes near the border of the disputed region. Around that same time, the United Nations Conference on Desertification announced that the Sahara was expanding at an estimated rate of 30 miles per year due to rising temperatures.? UNESCO granted Chinguetti and four other nearby trading posts status as World Heritage sites in 1996. Despite the international protection that designation affords, the city is succumbing to one of the most inhospitable landscapes in the world. Chinguetti’s location was once chosen for its fertility in the middle of the African desert. But now, it is surrounded by rolling red dunes, and blowing sand coats the city.? Just as the town’s population is in danger, so too are the town’s fragile books. A preservation survey UNESCO organized in the ’90s found that there were 3,450 volumes left in Chinguetti, but that 90 percent of them were in advanced stages of decay thanks to climate damage and mishandling.? The government of Mauritania, from the capital 375 miles away, has been attempting to preserve the delicate manuscripts, but keepers of the books have been wary to part with them. According to The Guardian, 33,000 ancient texts are known to exist in the country, but only a couple thousand have been properly cleaned and archived in the National Museum.? “The state has been trying to lay its hands on them for years,” one keeper of a 700 book-strong library told the paper. “Would you part with your hand or your foot? It is a part of us.”??