Page 26 - Liwa18-E

Ali Mohamed Al Matroshi

The widespread illiteracy had an adverse effect on the standard of education
generally. This preempted any idea to run a private cultural enterprise (a
bookshop, printing press, etc.), because it was doomed to fail and incur a
loss or at best could only generate a very little return, considering the weak
demand for it.

3. The sources of written knowledge were small in number, but the demand
from the tiny educated group was proportionally large. Consequently,
individuals had to bring educational material from abroad, and transcribe
copies of book by hand at times. Book collections in the early libraries
seldom exceeded a few dozen. Arab and Islamic periodicals brought from
some Arab countries were small in number and usually reached readers days
and even weeks after their publication.

4. The early founders of libraries were mainly Muslim clerics and students
of Islamic studies. Islamic Shari’a (law) books represented the greatest
proportion of library collections due to the predominant role of religion in
people’s lives. This gave early libraries a religious character.

5. The earliest libraries (private libraries) were solely used by the owners and
their immediate family. Therefore, it was natural that society could only
benefit indirectly from them, by the transfer of knowledge from those
owners (in the form of religious rulings, preaching and speeches, general
information, enlightened opinions, advice, guidance, reading literary
passages, storytelling, folk medicine prescriptions, etc.).

The Main Libraries in Ajman in Early Times:
I will cite five examples of the Islamic Shari’a libraries, giving a brief description of
each:

1. The Library of Sheikh Ali bin Humaid bin Seif Al Nu’aimi:
Sheikh Ali was one of the earliest Islamic clerics in Ajman. He was Imam of and gave
sermons at the Ajman mosque. He lived through the rule of three of the Emirate’s
rulers: Sheikh Humaid II bin Rashid II Al Nu’aimi (1891-1900), Sheikh Abdul Aziz
II bin Humaid I Al Nu’aimi (1900-1910) and Sheikh Humaid III bin Abdul Aziz II
Al Nu’aimi (1910-1928). 1

Sheikh Ali had a library containing a few dozen of Shari’a books. During that period,
transcripts made up at least half of the holdings altogether, due to the scanty number
of incoming publications and people’s dependence on copying. Following the death
of Sheikh Ali in an unknown year (probably in the 1920s), his books inured to the

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