The Storied City: The Quest for Timbuktu and the Fantastic Mission to Save Its Past

Two tales of a city The historical race to discover one of the world s most mythologized places, and the story of how a contemporary band of archivists and librarians, fighting to save its ancient manuscripts from destruction at the hands of al Qaeda, added another layer to the legend To Westerners, the name Timbuktu long conjured a tantalizing paradise, an African El Dorado where even the slaves wore gold Beginning in the late eighteenth century, a series of explorers gripped by the fever for discovery tried repeatedly to reach the fabled city But one expedition after another went disastrously awry, succumbing to attack, the climate, and disease Timbuktu was rich in another way too A medieval center of learning, it was home to tens of thousands according to some, hundreds of thousands of ancient manuscripts, on subjects ranging from religion to poetry, law to history, pharmacology, and astronomy When al Qaeda linked jihadists surged across Mali in 2012, threatening the existence of these precious documents, a remarkable thing happened a team of librarians and archivists joined forces to spirit the manuscripts into hiding. New Read [ The Storied City: The Quest for Timbuktu and the Fantastic Mission to Save Its Past ] author [ Charlie English ] For Kindle ePUB or eBook – kino-fada.fr The city of Timbuktu with its ancient history has long captivated people Just the very name conjures up images of an oasis in the desert, a city full of exotic people and a place where the mysteries of the East meet the gateway to the dark continent of Africa It is a place that drew travellers in the Eighteenth century seeking the legendary place where even the slaves wore gold, but the desire to reach there was not always...Hints of spoilers below, so read on only if you know about this, or don t mind some discussion around the edges.Timbuktu it really is a magical name for a city, one that conjures up such strong impressions of the wild, inaccessible African El Dorado It is a place that captivates the imagination, it is a city so well recognised for the lack of knowledge about it, which is quite ironic Timbuktu was also a historic Islamic centre of learning and religion a fact discovered by the West only a Hints of spoilers below, so read on only if you know a...read as part of 2018 Irish Meridians Challengefascinating, switching between early European searches for the city of Timbuktu and 21st century struggles to preserve the culture in the face of extremistsat every point we shift along a spectrum from inflated expectations to low onesearly adventurers were spurred desire to discover a tra...Just one note the research done for this book is fucking amazing as it should be.I never realised how much Muslims were fascinated and respected the written word till I changed about this riveting story Timbuktu could be the home of the world s earliest university, a seat of learning where some of the giants of knowledge debated and wrote on rocks, leather and paper Over the period of time these learned men and their university disappeared, leaving behind only fables and heritage which their loyal children clung to, out of respect and honour They might not be able to know I never realised how much Muslims were fascinated and respected the written word till I changed about this riveting story Timbuktu could be the home of the world s earliest university, a seat of learning where some of the giants of knowledge debated and wrote on rocks, leather and paper Over the period of time these learned men and their university disappeared, leaving behind only fables and heritage which their loyal children clung to, out of respect and honour They might not be able to know what to do with the chronicles but they will still gaurd them with their life as it is their tradition They have successfully fought off man...I loved this book The history, in and of itself was mind boggling I am very impressed with this author and the research they put into this project BravoAn interesting way of telling two stories The first about the various European attempts to explore West Africa, the fixation of the mysterious city of Timbuktu and their eventual invasion The second is ...This promises an action adventure, but the level of detail, people, historic events and tales are borrowing the tale of the rescue mission under a mountain of details At first I thought it was just trying to stretch it into a full book, that we had to go through every single European Africa society and the biography of the explorers they sent off to find Timbuktu in alternating chapters with the real story of the mission to rescue the many ancient manuscripts of Timbuktu and of the few, if This promises an action adventure, but the level of detail, people, h...This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers To view it, click here Was kind of one of elusive squid books You invested all this time to find out what happened and then it closed with but did itThis book was given to me by a family member as an Xmas present Otherwise, admittedly knowing nothing about Timbuktu and its history and having otherpressing issues and topics to read about I probably never would have read it On the one hand, I am glad I did I learned a tremendous amount about the history of European efforts to find the city In the course of relating that history in a highly readable, narrative, journalistic rather than academic style the author taught me as much about This book was given to me by a family member as an Xmas present Otherwise, admittedly knowing nothing about Timbuktu and its history and having otherpressing issues and topics to read about I probably never would have read it On the one hand, I am glad I did I learned a tremendous amount about the history of European efforts to find the city In the course of relating that history in a highly readable, narrative, journalistic rather than academic style the author taught me as much about European prejudice, and ignorance as about Islamic culture over the ages I came away very impressed with the extent to which the people there built and sustained empires of political and intellectual pow...

• English
• 09 January 2019
Charlie English
• Hardcover
• 416 pages
• 1594634289
• Charlie English
• The Storied City: The Quest for Timbuktu and the Fantastic Mission to Save Its Past