UNESCO Funds $100k to Save Mauritania’s Ancient Islamic Manuscripts Amid 35% Rainfall Drop

Chinguetti, Mauritania, a medieval desert town, once thrived as a vital center of Islamic scholarship and trans-Saharan trade between the 13th and 17th centuries. Its family libraries house thousands of rare manuscripts covering Islamic jurisprudence, mathematics, medicine, and poetry. These historical documents, often stored in traditional mud-brick structures, face increasing threats from a changing climate.

A recent UNESCO project, valued at $100,000, supplied critical preservation equipment to 13 family libraries within Chinguetti in 2024. This initiative addresses the urgent need to protect an invaluable cultural heritage. Bookkeepers like Muhammad Gholam el-Habot actively manage these collections, emphasizing a personal duty to safeguard them for future generations and global understanding, stating, "I have to protect the heritage for myself and all humanity."

The preservation efforts arrive as Mauritania experiences significant environmental shifts. The country's annual rainfall has decreased by 35% since 1970, according to climate data analysis. This reduction, coupled with more frequent sandstorms and extreme temperatures, intensifies the pressure on fragile manuscripts and their traditional storage environments.

Lack of predictable rainfall and rising heat directly damages paper and bindings, making many texts irreparable. Moreover, traditional mud-brick libraries lack resilience against prolonged extreme heat or sudden, intense rain events. The UNESCO intervention aims to mitigate these climate-induced risks through improved storage and handling practices. Observers will track the effectiveness of these preservation strategies in a region increasingly impacted by climate variability.