CAIRO: The history of the Arab world is incomplete, with crucial documents that can fill the gaps, solve the mysteries and add to the region’s history sitting in the archives of foreign countries, experts say.
Recently, archivists and historians have been stepping up efforts to retrieve these rare records.
Egyptian and Arab experts were joined by the chiefs of the Italian, Spanish, German and Turkish national archives at a conference aimed at unifying efforts to find the best way to reclaim stolen documents and acquire copies of important records that belong to foreign countries.
Organized by the National Library and Archives in cooperation with the regional division of the International Council on Archives and the Islamic Organization for Education, Culture and Sciences (Isisco), the three-day conference was held at the Pyramisa Hotel this week.
Millions of Arab and Islamic documents are housed in foreign archives, the participants said, and they can provide answers and enriching the historical, sociological and political heritage of the region.
Some even said that the available chronicles of the region’s modern history, particularly those chapters relating to colonial times, have painted a bleak picture of the Arab people. The accessible records have portrayed Arabs merely as victims of colonialism and have underrated their achievements.
“There exist other truths that would contribute to balancing this lopsided view [of history], said Dr Mohamed Anagreh, of Jordan’s Al-Balqa’ Applied University.
“Look at what the Jews are doing in Israel. They are digging everywhere for traces that would prove their historical presence in Palestine. By attempting to gain access to Arab documents in foreign archives, we are doing the same, added the scholar.
The archives that house the documents on the history of the Kingdom of Aragon (an old kingdom in the Iberian peninsula) contain the largest amount of historical data on medieval times in the world. An essential part of these archives are records that bear witness to the interaction between Aragon and the Arab empire in the southern Mediterranean, said Jose Ramon of the Spanish Archives.
According to Dr Saed Maghawri of El Menufiya University, the Austria Public Library holds 50,000 Arab documents in its archives and only a few hundred of them have been released.
Moreover, Arabic, English and French manuscripts that relate to Tunisia and other North African countries that came under French colonial rule can be found in British archives, said Dr Abdel Wahid El Nabawi of Al-Azhar University. These records, he said, expose the rivalry between France and England over these lands.
Surprisingly, the archives of the US department of foreign affairs are replete with documents on Egypt dating back to 1832, said Dr Emad Hilal of Suez Canal University. The most valuable of these records highlight the US role in the 1919 Revolution against the British.
Meanwhile, the German archives house a wealth of records, mainly correspondences from the German ambassadors to the Ottoman Empire as well as reports from German consulates in Egypt, Iraq and the Fertile Crescent, according to Dr Wagih Atiqu of Cairo University.
The Vatican archives retain correspondences between the Pope and an Egyptian Catholic priest who lived during the reign of Mohamed Ali Pasha (1805-49). All of the messages are suspected to have revolved around a plot to catholicize the Copts of Egypt, according to a research paper by Dr Ahmed Mahmoud of the House of National Documents.
During the conference, experts debated the best way to utilize the wealth of records scattered around the world. While many pointed out the difficulty of reaching an agreement with foreign archives, others said that it is more important to make copies of these documents available to researchers.
More and more of these conferences and meetings have been taking place in recent years, which is proof that Arab countries are keen on finding these historical manuscripts and bringing them back home.
