Introduction
The Middle East; the Near East; Anatolia; Pars Orientis;
Pars Asiae. Or, simply, the Orient; Asia Minor; Central
Asia. Many and varied are the names that have been given
throughout the millennia to the lands and peoples who have populated
the area whose literary works form the collections in the custody
of the Near East Section of the African and Middle Eastern Division
of the Library of Congress. Essentially geographic designations
imposed upon this vital part of the world by the European West,
each of these names both obscures within it that region's manifold
achievements and promotes as many enduring stereotypes of its
inhabitants as the number of the rivers flowing through it.
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"We Taste the Spices of Arabia Yet Never
Feel the Scorching Sun Which Brings Them Forth."
Inscription above Statue of Commerce
Main Reading Room Thomas Jefferson Building
Library of Congress
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When the Near East Section celebrated its first fifty years of
existence in August 1995, with lectures, seminars, and an exhibit
of its choicest treasures, the last was fittingly called "Hearts
and Minds without Borders: The Near East Experience." These events
underlined the breadth and scope of its collections and the success
of its mission. The materials in the custody of the Orientalia
Division long ago formed the nucleus of the Library's major research
collection in all things Middle Eastern. In its breadth, the Library's
collection takes us far beyond stereotypes, elucidating the nature
of these ancient and modern societies and bringing forth both
their past and their present glories. In the years that have followed
that celebration the policies and activities that supported the
section's success in serving all aspects of the Library of Congress's
mission, but chiefly its mandate to collect and preserve the full
spectrum of the world's intellectual heritage and to guarantee
access to it, have continued.
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Illustrative of the memoirs of travelers through the
Middle East is one by Jean de Thevenot (1633-67), Relation
d'un voyage fait au Levant, published in Paris in 1665.
The engraving opposite the work's title page depicts the
author, in seventeenth- century Middle Eastern garb, pointing
out on a map the lands through which he traveled.
(Rare Book
and Special Collections Division)
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The Near East Section was created in 1945 as part of the Orientalia
Division, following the Allied victory in World War II. The war
had heightened interest in the lands and peoples of the Near East
and shown the need for extensive and reliable knowledge of the
area. The section was given the custody of materials in over thirty-five
vernacular languages spoken and written in lands stretching from
the Atlantic coast of North Africa through the steppes of Central
Asia; from the lush Caucasus mountain range in the north past
the tropical Gulf States in the south. With the African Section,
it now shares responsibility for the African countries that are
part of the Arab League--the Sudan and the sub-Saharan countries
of Mauritania, Somalia, Comoros, and Djibouti. The Hebraic Section
handles the country of Israel, materials in Hebrew, Coptic, and
Syriac languages, and the majority of the languages (and cultures)
of the Ancient Near East. Combined with the immense number of
works both in the Library's General Collections and in the many
other custodial divisions of the Library of Congress, collections
in Arabic, Armenian, Central Asian, Georgian, Persian, and Turkish
languages, to name only the major linguistic groupings housed
in the Near East Section, form a powerful research center.
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The internationally renowned Central Asian author Chingiz
Aitmatov, a freethinker in Soviet era Kirghizstan, has remained
popular in his native country even after independence. Shown
is an illustration from "The First Teacher," published
in an anthology of short stories (Bishkek, 1963).
(Near
East Section)
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Vernacular collections are complemented by particular works in
the Library's general and special collections, where materials
relevant to the Middle East as a whole are found. Important Arabic,
Armenian, Persian, Georgian, and Turkish manuscripts, along with
their choicest illuminations from the imposing Greek monastic
establishments at Mount Athos, from the Monastery of St. Catherine
on Mt. Sinai, and from the Armenian and Greek Patriarchates of
Jerusalem, were microfilmed as sets by the Library of Congress
in the early 1950s and continue to be heavily used resources in
the Microform Reading Room.
Other riveting examples are the accounts of travelers through
North Africa, the Caucasus, the Middle East, and Central Asia--precious
for their eyewitness testimony to religious, cultural, and political
conditions--that fill the shelves of the Rare Book and Special
Collections Division and are found as well in the Library's General
Collections.
The Manuscript Division possesses a rich storehouse of the private
papers of government officials who served the United States and
of missionaries who served their faith in the various regions
of the Middle East. To these should be added the numerous publications
of the Near East Relief Committee retained in the General Collections.
Its charge was to assist the Middle Eastern countries, such as
Armenia, Syria, and Turkey, to recover from the ravages that the
First World War inflicted on them and their people.
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Jewish emigration from Georgia within the last three
decades has created a thriving and influential community
in the state of Israel. Contemporary author and poet Itzhak
David's Lamazi kristiani gogo uplis saplavtan
(The beautiful Christian girl at the Lord's tomb) is
a fine example of Georgian publications from Jerusalem.
(Reproduced with permission of Itzhak David)
(Near
East Section)
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The Law Library holds records of the laws and legal interpretations
from these lands throughout the ages. Babylon's law code of Hammurabi,
which dates from the eighteenth century B.C., and the modern law
code of the Republic of Egypt are both found here. This important
repository houses as well tomes on Islamic law, such as the massive
six-volume collection of anafi Muslim laws and legal interpretations,
al-Fatawa al-Alamgiriyah (1850),
and collections of the canon law and acts of the councils of all
the Christian churches of the East, such as the Armenian Kanonagirk
Hayots (The Book of Canons).
The rapid and cursory glance through the Library's visual and
intellectual treasures that follows will suggest how these materials
document the complex life of the Middle East from remote antiquity
to contemporary times.
Levon Avdoyan
Armenian and Georgian Area Specialist, Near East Section
Near East Collections was written by Levon Avdoyan,
Armenian and Georgian area specialist in the Near East Section,
under the general guidance of Beverly Gray, chief of the African
and Middle Eastern Division, with the collegiality of the authors
of the guides to the African and Hebraic collections, Joanne Zellers
and Michael Grunberger, respectively, and the expertise and assistance
of the talented specialists of the Near East Section: Mary Jane
Deeb, George Selim, and Fawzi Tadros (Arabica); Christopher Murphy
(Turcica); and Ibrahim Pourhadi (Iranica). Special thanks to Sarah
Ozturk and Kay Ritchie, of the Middle East/North Africa cataloging
team, for their knowledgeable suggestions, to Jim Higgins of the
Photoduplication Services for his skill and adaptability, and
to Evelyn Sinclair of the Publishing Office for her insightful
and valuable editorial advice.
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