Malians Vow to Protect Ancient Timbuktu Manuscripts

Hawa Touré, Director of the Kati Fund, the largest private library in Timbuktu, has taken refuge with relatives in Bamako. She managed to take a dozen documents that are now kept in a secret location. Nearly 13,000 documents were dispersed among neighbors to protect them from Islamists.

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4 months ago

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World, Arts & Society

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Africa, History

People

Hawa Touré

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Mali, Bamako

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SHOTLIST: BAMAKO, FEBRUARY 17, 2013, SOURCE: AFPTV -VAR of Hawa Touré (woman), Kati Fund Administrator SOUNDBITE 1 Hawa Touré (woman), Kati Fund Administrator (the largest private library in Timbuktu) (French, 16 secs): "If they take clothes, it is not serious. If they take the beds its ok, but if you take manuscripts to destroy them, all the work we have done would be in vain because the writing will disappear forever." [French]: "Si on te retire des habilles, ce n'est pas grave. Si on te retire des couchettes ce n'est pas grave, mais si on te retire un manuscrit qui vont détruire, donc l'effort qu'on avait fait avant c'est en vain parce que l'écrit va disparaître et tu ne sauras pas où le chercher." - VAR of posters with reproductions of original manuscripts from the mosque of Timbuktu SOUNDBITE 2 Hawa Touré (woman), Kati Fund Administrator (the largest private library in Timbuktu) (French, 18 secs): "One was in a bag here, two in a bag there. I managed to bring around ten. This is very insignificant compared to 12,527 manuscripts ... ten manuscripts? That's nothing! " [French]: "C'est un dans un sac par ici, deux dans un sac par là. Peut-être jusqu'à arriver ici je n'ai pas pu qu'emmener dix. C'est très insignifiant sur 12527 manuscrits… une dizaine ce n'est rien !" - Exterior of the house - Hawa with her children SOUNDBITE 3 Hawa Touré (woman), Kati Fund Administrator (the largest private library in Timbuktu) (French, 7 secs): "It is we who are the guardians of these manuscripts who have dispersed them to secure them." [French]: "C'est nous même qui sommes les gardiens de ces écrits qui les avons dispersé pour les sécurisé." -VAR Hawa making tea /// ----------------------------------------------- AFP TEXT STORY: Old families keep the secret of Timbuktu's manuscripts BAMAKO (Mali) 28 February 2013 AFP (Anne Le Coz) Though armed Islamists have left their town, the grand old families of Timbuktu are still wary of revealing the secret of how they safeguarded thousands of ancient manuscripts from destruction by extremists. Before they fled the fabled desert town in northern Mali at the end of January, the Islamists sacked part of the public Ahmed Baba Centre library, burning some 3,000 documents they considered sacrilegious. It was their second attempt to harm Timbuktu's rich cultural heritage, after already destroying the mausoleums of 11 saints there in April last year. In mid-February, the UN cultural body UNESCO announced an action plan worth 10 million dollars (7.5 million euros) to restore the cultural heritage of northern Mali and preserve manuscripts that attest to the intellectual and spiritual flourishing of Timbuktu -- listed a world heritage site -- in the 15th and 16th centuries. Unlike the Ahmed Baba Centre, about 30 private libraries in the ancient town were spared by the Islamists. For several months, their owners had dispersed their collections to put them in safe places, as their ancestors did in the past. When the Islamists entered Timbuktu last April, Ismael Diadie Haidara al-Quti, a descendant of Mali's imperial Askia family and of Ali al-Quti, a Visigoth from Toledo in Spain who converted to Islam, fled with his family and took a dozen manuscripts with him. "We hid them among clothes and embarked on a boat to head down the river towards the south," said his wife Hawa Toure, manager of the Mahmud Kati (al-Quti) Fund, the main private library in Timbuktu, which keeps almost 13,000 recorded manuscripts. "Afterwards, we looked for people who could help us, ordinary people who were not being watched. They bought caskets and keys. Some of them fled with the caskets by boat, others buried them in the sand." Hawa added that her husband, who has been in Spain for several months, was the only person to know "who hid the manuscripts and how to get them back". 'Back in the time of secrecy' It is not the first time Ismael al-Quti's precious collection has had to be smuggled to safety. "Our library has already suffered four dispersals in five centuries, since my ancestor fled Toledo in 1467 until the last dispersal in the 19th century to protect manuscripts from the fundamentalists of the Peul kingdom of Massina" in central Mali, he told AFP by telephone. "Unfortunately in 2012, we again found ourselves forced to disperse them. It's like pushing a stone up a mountain and watching it roll down again," he added. At 55, Ismael, a renowned historian, poet and philosopher, has spent almost a third of his life looking to retrieve these scattered treasures to bring them together in a library that opened in 2003, with the help of Spanish government aid. "Our manuscripts are mostly Korans, but there are also legal and scientific texts on mathematics, astronomy and medicine... The special feature of these writings -- in Arabic, in Peul, in English or in French -- is the annotations made in the margins," al-Quti said. Some of these notes are even concealed within the covers of the texts. "They are family secrets, rulings, but also sometimes indications that enable 'the keeper of the secret' to find hidden manuscripts again," said his wife Hawa, now a refugee with her children in a working class district of the capital, Bamako. "Today, nobody will tell you where he has hidden manuscripts", the 45-year-old added in a gentle voice. "If families had agreed, like the ministry and aid donors wanted, to put the manuscripts at the disposal of the Ahmed Baba Centre, they would all be lost." "We're back in the time of secrecy," her husband said. "When I decided to create this library, a part of the family said 'No, it's dangerous.' But as a historian, I felt they should be displayed. Alas, now I ask myself if my family wasn't right." Funds alone will not save the manuscripts from being destroyed or trafficked abroad in the future and sold, said al-Quti, who was sceptical of the UN action plan. "UNESCO should rethink its heritage policy." "It's not just money that is needed. UNESCO should directly involve the librarians and define a legal, administrative and security framework. If they don't do that, they will fail again," he warned. In the meantime, al-Quti will keep the location of his manuscripts secret. "For five centuries our library has faced upheavals. We're in no hurry." alc/stb/nb/vjf