Digital Humanities: Timbuktu Project

Project Digitizes Works From the Golden Age of TimbuktuHarlan Wallach/NUAMPS

RESCUE MISSION At a new studio in Timbuktu imaging teams digitize rare works.

By JOHN NOBLE WILFORDPublished: May 20, 2008

From Timbuktu to here, to reverse theexpression, the written words of the legendary African oasis are beingdelivered by electronic caravan. A lode of books and manuscripts, someonly recently rescued from decay, is being digitized for the Internetand distributed to scholars worldwide.

Enlarge This ImageSavama-DCI

A legal opinion on the rules for buying and selling goods.

Enlarge This ImageRahim Rajan/Aluka

The Djinguereber Mosque.

Enlarge This ImageSavama-DCI

A map.

The New York Times

These are works of law andhistory, science and medicine, poetry and theology, relics ofTimbuktu?s golden age as a crossroads in Mali for trade in gold, saltand slaves along the southern edge of the Sahara. If the name is now asynonym for mysterious remoteness, the literature attests to Timbuktu?searlier role as a vibrant intellectual center.

In recent years,thousands of these leather-bound books and fragile manuscripts havebeen recovered from family archives, private libraries and storerooms.The South African government is financing construction of a library inTimbuktu to house more than 30,000 of the books. Other gifts supportrenovations of family libraries and projects for preserving,translating and interpreting the documents.

Now, the first five of the rare manuscripts from private libraries have been digitized and made available online (www.aluka.org) to scholars and students. At least 300 are expected to be available online by the end of the year.

Theproject to collect the digital manuscripts is being organized by Aluka,an international nonprofit company devoted to bringing knowledge fromand about Africa to the scholarly world.

In partnership with aconsortium of private libraries in Timbuktu and with financing from theAndrew W. Mellon Foundation, Aluka enlisted media technicians from Northwestern University to design and set up a high-resolution digital photo studio in Timbuktu. A local staff was trained to operate the studio.

Manydocuments in the graceful Arabic calligraphy are a visual delight.Although the writing is mostly in Arabic, quite a few manuscripts arein vernaculars adapted to the Arabic script, which is sure to pose achallenge for scholars.

?The manuscripts of Timbuktu add greatdepth to our understanding of Africa?s diverse history andcivilizations,? said Rahim S. Rajan, the collection development managerat Aluka.

Researchers have been struck by the range of subjectsthat attracted Timbuktu?s scholars over several centuries and into the19th century. Most of the first digitized ones are from the 17ththrough 19th centuries. The topics include the sciences of astronomy,mathematics and botany; literary arts; Islamic religious practices andthought; proverbs; legal opinions; and historical accounts.

?Itis a rich corpus of historical and intellectual literature that is justbeginning to become more widely understood and accessible to a broadergroup of scholars and researchers,? said Mr. Rajan, a specialist inMiddle East studies.

In a recent seminar conducted online,members of the Aluka-Northwestern team described some of the problemsin starting the digitizing facility in Timbuktu: frequent interruptionsof electric power and dust storms fouling delicate electroniccomponents.

?It wasn?t as bad as other places that I?ve seen,?said Harlan Wallach, director of the Advanced Media Production Studioat Northwestern, who has set up similar installations in Asia. ?We blewout a lot more transformers and equipment working on a project in Chinathan in Timbuktu.?

While there may be no substitute for seeingthe actual manuscripts, Mr. Wallach said, it is better to read them inthe digitized form. Many of the pages are so fragile they should not behandled.

Even if Timbuktu today is a dusty, mud-brick shadow ofits past renown, living mainly on the few tourists attracted by itsname and legend, the pages of its history are emerging from obscurityand, in some cases, are being disseminated by the speed of light.