Ottoman manuscripts come to the digital environment

Ottoman manuscripts in the Balkans will be digitally available. AA photo

Within the scope of a project titled “Recovering Cultural Heritage in the Balkans,” experts from Turkey are transferring Ottoman manuscripts into a digital environment in Macedonia, home to the largest number of Ottoman manuscripts in the Balkans after Bosnia Herzegovina. 

Gazi University Turkish Research and Application Center (TÖMER) Director Professor Yaşar Aydemir said that it was an initiative of the Yunus Emre Institute. He said that they had started to transfer the world into the digital environment in Bosnia Herzegovina, and were continuing with Serbia, Albania and now Macedonia. 

As well as religious works in the Arabic language kept in the St. Kliment Ohridski Macedonia National University Library in Skopje and 3,743 books in the fields of medicine, law and agriculture, they were also transferring the works at the Macedonia Archive and Islamic Union Faculty of Theology Library into the digital environment. 

Director of St. Kliment Ohridski Macedonia National University Library Mile Bosheski said that they had gathered those works during a process lasting 50 years. “The damaged works will also be restored,” Bosheski said. 

The project, directed by Aydemir, Yıldız Technical University member Professor Cihan Okuyucu, Süleymaniye Library former director Nevzat Kaya and Gazi University member Professor Nurettin Ceviz, is set to be finished in 18 months.

aferin !