he department "Eastern Manuscripts and Rare Books" of Leiden University Library possesses many manuscripts in Arabic and Turkish script from the Ottoman Empire era.

Jan Willem Klein, one of our Arabic calligraphy students, came up with a nice idea to visit this department with the students. On Wednesday January 29, we visited the library and the curator Arnout Vrolijk gave us a manuscript presentation. It was nice to do something with the students outside of a class environment and witness the centuries old manuscripts and calligraphy pieces. This helped our calligraphy students connect their daily art practicing with the art form's actual historical background.

If you would like to join a free trial-session of our Arabic calligraphy courses, you can review here.

Some pictures from the day: