Turkish works in Vatican Library

Through a newly signed protocol, the Yunus Emre Institute has initiated a project to classify works in the Turkish language and others related to Turkey that are being kept in the Vatican Library.

According to a statement made on the institute’s official website, the protocol, signed by the Turkish Ambassador to the Vatican Kenan Gürsoy, commissioned academics for the project and they began work on classification on June 18.

The statement said the project was very important in Turkey’s history of science.

Through the project, Turkish manuscripts, printed works, and many works on Turkish language, history, literature and culture written in foreign languages, will be classified and an updated catalogue will be prepared.

“Specialists including Professor Belkıs Gürsoy, Professor Mahmur Kaplan, Associate Professor Mehmet Gümüşkılıç, Dr. Tacettin Kayaoğlu, Dr. Rinaldo Marmara and Dr. Delio Proverbio gathered for the first time in 2011 with the initiation of the Yunus Emre Institute. 

As a result of their examination, the project team determined some mistakes and deficiencies in the Turkish Manuscripts Catalogue, written by Ettore Rossi in 1953. 

They decided that there could be many works that were not classified in the catalogue, and therefore a new classification and catalogue was necessary,” read the institute’s statement.

The statement continued that thanks to the new classification, unknown works would be revealed and relations between the Ottoman state and the Vatican would become better understood.

The new catalogue will be jointly published by the Vatican Library and the Yunus Emre Institute, and a gap in this field will thus be filled for specialists, the statement continued.