Islamic manuscripts in Polish, Czech and Slovakian public libraries, archives and private collections

Abstract

There are hundreds rare manuscripts written in Arabic, Turkic, Farsi, Polish, Russian and Belorussian languages preserved in 21 public and private collections located in Poland. The largest collections of these mostly Muslim manuscripts are in the Wroclaw University Library ( the former German Breslau University in Lower Silesia), in the National Museum ( Czartoryski Department) at Cracow and in the National Library at Warsaw. Many Polish public and academic institutions purchased those rare documents of Islamic literature from mostly private booksellers, collectors and relatives of authors in both the East and the West. The fine tradition of gathering of Islamic art and books in Poland had been initiated by the Orientophiles of the 18th and the 19th century CE. The desire to know more about Islamic civilization was inspired by such Romantic explorers of “Orient” as famous Polish aristocrats as Czartoryski, Zamoyski, Dzialynski, Radziwill, Potocki, or Rzewuski. Definitely, the most ‘exotic’ manuscripts from the Polish collections are works (kitaby, hamaily, tafsiry ) written by Polish or Lithunian Muslims of Tatar origin. Author of this paper surveys also catalogues and collections of these Islamic manuscripts from the Czech and Slovakian archives. His paper is illustrated by copies of several Islamic MSS from author’s digitalized private files.