Page 171 - Arabiab Studies (IV)
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The Omani Manuscript Collection at
Muscat
PARTI
A General Description of the MSS
G. R. Smith
The writer was invited to spend a short time in Muscat during
October 1976. The kind and generous invitation to go there to
examine some recently collected Arabic manuscripts was extended
by the Minister of National Heritage of the Sultanate of Oman,
His Excellency Sayyid Fay$al b. ‘All A1 Sa‘id. His Excellency is
continuing in this new ministry the previously established policy of
the Sultanate to collect wherever possible examples of Oman’s rich
cultural heritage, including the abundant Arabic manuscript
material which exists throughout the country. Pending the creation
of a National Museum and Library, these treasures are to be
housed in the Ministry itself. The present writer wishes to record
here his thanks to His Excellency Sayyid Fay$al for affording him
the opportunity to visit Oman, to study the manuscripts and
photograph them in preparation for this study. The writer’s
gratitude is also extended to other scholars who were in Oman at
the same time and who assisted in a number of ways his study of
the manuscripts: Professors C. F. Beckingham, T. M. Johnstone
and R. B. Seijeant, Dr R. L. Bidwell and Mr Y. H. Safadi. Special
thanks are due to Dr J. C. Wilkinson, who was also kind enough to
agree to add his own notes to these descriptions and who has
written Part II of this study. Dr Wilkinson’s notes in Part I are
prefaced by the initials J. C. W. and are contained in brackets.
A number of agonising decisions regarding the Omani manu
scripts and how they could best be announced to the world of
scholarship had to be faced in Muscat. Time was short, very short,
and where was one to start, faced with almost 2,000 manuscripts
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