News & Notes: University creates digital Islamic manuscript archive

The manuscripts were selected from about 9,500 volumes of manuscripts in the Department of Rare Books and Special Collections as part of the Islamic Manuscripts Cataloging and Digitization Project. The project, largely funded by the David A. Gardner ’69 Magic Project, is in its fourth year.

Princeton’s collection is the foremost in the Western hemisphere, Curator of Manuscripts Don Skemer said in a University statement.

This digitization project is likely the first of many, as the University looks to extend its online collection. Skemer added that the project “was conceived specifically as a way for the library to improve access to these rich collections and share them worldwide through digital technology.”

The manuscripts in the University’s collection are written in Arabic, Persian, Ottoman Turkish and other languages, and they “date from the early centuries of Islam until the fall of the Ottoman Empire.” They come from locations across the Islamic world, from Spain to Indonesia. The documents cover subjects including “history, biography, philosophy and logic, theology … law and jurisprudence, language, literature, book arts and illustration, magic and occult sciences, astrology, astronomy, mathematics, medicine and other aspects of the spiritual and intellectual life of the Islamic world,” according to the statement.

Robert Garrett, Class of 1897, donated roughly two-thirds of the collection in 1942.