At the height of the Mali Empire, Timbuktu was the intellectual epicenter of West Africa. The University of Sankoré, along with two other major institutions, formed a university complex that rivaled Europe’s greatest centers of learning. It’s estimated there were between 300,000 and 700,000 manuscripts, covering subjects from poetry to advanced astronomy. The book trade was so profitable that some volumes cost more than a horse. The city was a strategic hub on the trans-Saharan trade routes, con

At the height of the Mali Empire, Timbuktu was the intellectual epicenter of West Africa. The University of Sankoré, along with two other major institutions, formed a university complex that rivaled Europe’s greatest centers of learning. It’s estimated there were between 300,000 and 700,000 manuscripts, covering subjects from poetry to advanced astronomy. The book trade was so profitable that some volumes cost more than a horse. The city was a strategic hub on the trans-Saharan trade routes, con

Aminatta Forna tells the story of legendary Timbuktu and its long hidden legacy of hundreds of thousands of ancient manuscripts. With its university founded around the same time as Oxford, Timbuktu is proof that the reading and writing of books have long been as important to Africans as to Europeans. See http://murakushsociety.org/shop/books/introduction-to-moorish-race-nationality/ | Moorish History