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A manuscript page from Timbuktu showing a table of astronomical information. Timbuktu Manuscripts, or Tombouctou Manuscripts, is a blanket term for the large number of historically significant manuscripts that have been preserved for centuries in private households in Timbuktu, a city in northern Mali.
These manuscripts, known as the Timbuktu Manuscripts, date from the 12th to early 20th centuries, and cover a wide range of subjects including history, philosophy and religion, science, medicine, and poetry, written in various languages. [7] Haidara began cataloging the library with support from the al-Furqan Heritage Foundation in London. [1]
Despite its illustrious history, as of 2009 Timbuktu was an impoverished town, poor even by Third World standards. [ 75 ] [ 76 ] The population grew an average 5.7% per year from 29,732 in 1998 to 54,453 in 2009. [ 77 ]
The centre holds approximately 20,000 manuscripts covering Mali's history, including the Tarikh al-Sudan.The majority of the manuscripts are from the 14th to 16th centuries, and most are written in Arabic but others are in local languages, such as Songhai, Tamashek and Bamanankan, or even in more distant ones, one each in Turkish and Hebrew, with topics covering medicine, astronomy, poetry ...
[10] Additionally, West African manuscripts contain a history of the populations of the Timbuktu region, Tārīkh Iwellemedan, and the Risāla fī ẓuhūr al-khalīfa al-thānī ‘ashar, which was composed by Nūḥ b. al-Ṭāhir al-Fulānī (d. 1860) as a "propaganda pamphlet" on behalf of the leader of the Fulani Empire of Masina, Aḥmad b.
During his visit to Timbuktu in 1895 the French journalist Félix Dubois learnt of the chronicle but was unable to obtain a copy. [2] Most copies of the manuscript had been destroyed early in the 19th century by the order of the Fula [3] leader Seku Amadu, but in 1911 an old manuscript was located in Timbuktu that was missing some of the initial pages.
The Timbuktu Manuscripts showing both mathematics and astronomy. [81] Muslims made several important improvements [which?] to the theory and construction of sundials, which they inherited from their Indian and Greek predecessors. Khwarizmi made tables for these instruments which considerably shortened the time needed to make specific calculations.
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