Manuscripts Documentation News

The positive echo resonating from the implementation of the pilot project of the documentation of Islamic and Scientific Manuscripts as well as its captivating multi-lingual deliverables has resulted in collaboration requests to CultNat, as an executing agency, from various institutions to enhance the continuum of the series entitled "The Contributions of Islamic and Arab Civilizations to ….." by documenting new topics and digitizing manuscripts archived unknowingly to the world of scholars and researchers.

Phase two of the project is based on two different collections. The first incorporates astronomy and time reckoning and will be conducted at al-Azhar Library, one the world's oldest living institutions. Astronomy was chosen due, not only, to the sufficient number of manuscripts in their vaults and their rapid degenerating condition but also to the importance of the topic as well as the lasting and unequivocal mark in the annals of astronomy left by Arabs and Muslims such as Yaqub ibn Tariq, al-Kwarizmi, al-Farghani, al-Sufi, al-Biruni, and al-Tusi. The second collection is mathematics and mechanics from an already identified private collection available on microfiche.