Ahmed Baba Institute, Research library and cultural center in Timbuktu, Mali
The Ahmed Baba Institute is a research library and center in Timbuktu, Mali, that holds thousands of manuscripts written over many centuries. The texts are in Arabic and several regional languages, covering knowledge produced across the wider West African world.
The institute was founded in 1973 under a different name and was later moved into a purpose-built facility that opened in 2009, designed by a South African architect. The move gave the collections much better conditions for long-term care.
The manuscripts here cover subjects like medicine, astronomy, poetry, and Islamic law, written by scholars who lived and worked in Timbuktu. They show how the city was once a meeting point for knowledge coming from across West Africa and beyond.
The institute is in central Timbuktu and can be reached on foot from most of the city's main sites. Access to parts of the collection may be restricted, so it is worth checking in advance what visitors are allowed to see.
During the armed conflict that hit Timbuktu in 2012, thousands of manuscripts were secretly moved out of the city by local families and volunteers to keep them from being seized. Many of those documents were hidden in Bamako for years before being brought back.
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