Orient

The Oriental collection counts around 242,000 printed volumes of original-language literature and 6,750 manuscripts in the languages Arabic, Persian, Turkish and Turkic languages, Pashto, Hebrew, Yiddish, Ethiopian, Armenian, Coptic, Syrian, Armenian and Middle Persian (Zend) and languages of the ancient Orient. These stocks have been built up systematically over the centuries according to scholarly criteria, representing important resources for research and education on a national and international level.

Geographically, the acquisition of monographs and periodicals is focussed on North Africa, the Near and the Middle East. The main focus of the content of original-language acquisitions is on humanities – philosophy, religion (Islam, Judaism, Christian Orient), history, archaeology, linguistics and literature, ethnic studies, architecture and art and classic text editions. A broad range of secondary literature in west European languages is acquired. More ...