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University of Utah  Marriott Library Special Collections Middle East Library |
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| University of Utah Marriott Library Special Collections Middle East Library |
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801-581-6311
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The Aziz S. Atiya Middle East Library The Aziz S. Atiya Middle East Library is a prestigious collection of the J. Willard Marriott Library at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City . The Library is one of the largest in North America and is recognized internationally as a major center for research in Middle East studies.
The collection contains books, manuscripts and periodicals as well as rare materials written in both Western languages and in the major languages of the Middle East : Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Ottoman Turkish, and modern Turkish. The Middle East Library contains over 12,000 bound journal volumes, over 150,000 books, over 3,000 rare books, 1,564 Arabic papyri, parchment and rag-paper documents from the eighth to the eleventh centuries. In addition, our microforms collection includes 13, 371 manuscripts. The Library receives some Middle Eastern newspapers daily and three of them are archived on microfilm. The Middle East Library holdings are a circulating collection, except for rare items and historical documents. In addition, one can access the online version of many Middle Eastern newspapers via our links above.
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The Middle East Library was established by professor Dr. Aziz S. Atiya along with the Middle East Center . In 1959 Dr. Ray Olpin, President of the University of Utah , asked Dr. Atiya, a native of Egypt and scholar of Medieval history, to become the founding director of the Middle East Center for the university. Along with his wife Lola, Dr. Atiya established the Middle East Library and its rare book collection. In 1979 they began compiling The Coptic Encyclopedia , which was published in 1991, after Dr. Atiya's death . 
The Middle East Library's holdings are a circulating collection, except for rare or specialized items. There are specialized collections, such as the Arabic papyri, parchment, and rag-paper documents from the 8 th to the 11 th centuries; the Judaica- Hebraica collection; a Kaballah and mysticism collection totaling 700 manuscripts; and the manuscript collections of the Library/Middle East Center's founder Dr. Aziz S. Atiya, Arab diplomat Dr. Fayez A. Sayegh, and the renown historian of science Dr. Martin Levey.