This extract barely scratches the surface of the misinformation, vested interests, political maneuvering, and even outright duplicity surrounding the claimed looting of the libraries of Timbuktu. The real story of what happened has not yet been written. dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-0…
I have some first-hand knowledge about this. When reading about the Timbuktu libraries, bear in mind three things:
1. The news in 2013 was almost pure catnip to NGOs and cultural charities, instantly confirmed the world-view....1/2
of right-leaning ones (ISIS are culture-destroying Islamofascists) AND left leaning ones (Africa is the repository of ancient wisdom). You could hardly, even in theory, conjure up a set of circumstances more likely to engage the interests of NGOs & philanthropic foundations. 2/2
2. Contrary to the impression created in most news reports, only a tiny fraction of the manuscripts in these libraries are particularly early, most are 18th to early 20th century, and most of them are standard texts and Qur'ans.
3. The families who control these manuscript are not necessarily all selfless guardians of ancient desert wisdom. Many - including most of the owners of the largest libraries - are wealthy and politically well-connected Malian elite "aristocracy".... 1/2
..... for whom the western reaction to the 2013 reports of the “destruction of Timbuktu libraries” represented an unprecedented, once-in-a-lifetime monetization opportunity. 2/2
None of this is to deny that some manuscripts were destroyed, nor to deny the some Western organizations have done wonderful work in Timbuktu, especially the @visitHMML digitization efforts under the guidance of the extraordinary @ColumbaStewart. hmml.org/about/father-c…
But there really is a vast gulf between what one learns about the Timbuktu libraries from press reports (based as they almost always are on NGO or publisher's press-releases), and what actually happened in 2013, and has happened in Timbuktu since then.
For an idea of what I mean by "monetization opportunities" look at Swann's 2015 sale of an ordinary 18th cent. West African qur'an for $50 000. The normal value of a ms like this is $500, so the Timbuktu provenance accounted for literally 99% of the price. swanngalleries.com/3dcat/2408/fil…
To limit this to what I know from direct knowledge not hearsay, I should have said "some of the owners" in the tweet above, not "most of the owners"
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This is the Rongorongo script of Easter Island. Rongorongo lacks an accepted decipherment but is generally presumed to encode an earlier stage of Rapa Nui, the contemporary Polynesian language of the island. It is possible that it represents an independent invention of writing. 1/
Hundreds of tablets written in Rongorongo existed as late as 1864 but most were lost or destroyed in that period and only 26 of undoubted authenticity remain today; almost all inscribed on wood. Each text has between two and over two thousand glyphs (some have what appear to be compound glyphs). 2/
The longest surviving text is that on the ‘Santiago Staff’: around 2,500 glyphs, depending upon how the characters are divided. The glyph-types are a mixture of geometric figures and standardized representations of living organisms; each glyph is around one centimetre in height. 3/
Oy. Forget about being a "rabbi", if you had even a kindergarten level knowledge of Hebrew (or Judaism for that matter) you'd know that this is not old, not Jewish, not an amulet, and nothing to do with kabbalah (which you grotesquely mischaracterize). It's a crude mishmash of… https://t.co/3IJjWrqnIp https://t.co/U7OBn124MNtwitter.com/i/web/status/1…
When looking at any purportedly ancient Jewish manuscript, bear in mind: 1. Jewish manuscripts are generally austerely plain and written in black ink only. Red ink is seen occasionally as a highlight color in for example Yemenite manuscripts, but gold ink is essentially never… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
Oi u luzi chervona kalyna - Oh, the Red Guelder Rose in the Meadow - is the anthem of 🇺🇦 Ukrainian resistance to Russian oppression.
Written in 1875, it was adapted by Stepan Charnetsky in 1914 to honor the Sich Riflemen of the First World War. 1/ twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
The red guelder rose or viburnum of the song ('kalyna' in Ukrainian) - a shrub that grows four to five metres tall - is referenced throughout Ukrainian folklore. It is depicted in silhouette along the edges of the flag of the President of Ukraine. 2/
Due to the song's association with the Ukrainian people's aspiration for independence, singing of the song was banned during the period in which Ukraine was a Soviet Republic(1919-1991). Anyone caught singing it was jailed, beaten, and even exiled. 3/
Bought this this morning at our regular Sunday market in Bon-Encontre.
This bread is called a 'tortillon', and has been made since the late 17th century ONLY in this one tiny village just outside Agen in the Lot-et-Garonne, ONLY on Sundays and holidays in the month of May.
The tortillon celebrates the feast days of Notre-Dame de Bon-Encontre in May.
The flour is blanched and then boiled in hot water, before being baked in a wood oven. It's traditionally eaten with sausages and white wine. 2/
The idea that there's an entirely unique type of bread that exists exclusively in one tiny French village for 5 or 6 days of the year only - and that this has been the unchanged situation for over 300 years - is exactly the kind of thing that makes me love living in France. 3/
This is the 2001 first edition of the Ruhnama (Book of the Soul), written by Saparmurat Niyazov, the self-styled Türkmenbaşy, President of Turkmenistan from 1990 to 2006, intended to serve as the "spiritual guidance of the nation" and the "centre of the Turkmen universe". 1/ twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
The Ruhnama was introduced to Turkmen culture in a gradual but increasingly all-pervasive way. Niyazov first placed copies in all the nation's schools and libraries - but by the end of his reign, an exam on its teachings was an essential element of the driving test... 2/
It was mandatory to study the Ruhnama in all schools, universities and governmental organisations. New governmental employees were tested in detail on the book in job interviews. 3/
Huge excitement here at the Incunabula Library - 26th April is OLD PERMIC ALPHABET DAY! 🥳🎉 🍾
Old Permic script (Важ Перым гижӧм), sometimes also called ANBUR, was used to write medieval Komi, a Uralic language spoken by the Komi peoples in the northeastern European part of Russia. 2/
Old Permic was developed by the Russian missionary, St Stephen of Perm (Степан Храп, св. Стефан Пермский) in 1372. The name Anbur is derived from the names of the first 2 characters: An and Bur. The script is derived from Cyrillic, Greek, and runic-style Komi "Tamga" glyphs. 3/