Al-Qarawiyyin Library

Oldest continuously operating library in the world, recently restored and open to scholars

The library attached to Al-Qarawiyyin mosque is the oldest continuously operating library in the world, founded in the ninth century alongside the university itself. For centuries it was closed to outsiders and largely inaccessible even to many scholars. A major restoration project completed in 2016 reopened the building and made the collection accessible to researchers, while protecting the most fragile manuscripts in climate-controlled storage.

Visitors cannot enter without a scholarly purpose, but the exterior — accessible through the maze of lanes that surround Al-Qarawiyyin — is itself remarkable. The carved wooden screens and carved plaster of the entrance facade are visible from the alley. The library is worth seeking out for its location alone, deep in the academic quarter of the medina, where the lanes are lined with paper and ink sellers who have supplied the university's students for centuries.

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A story
The library holds a ninth-century manuscript of the Quran, illuminated Merinid manuscripts, and a thirteenth-century copy of Ibn Khaldun's Muqaddimah — one of the founding texts of sociology and historiography, written by a scholar who studied in Fez. The collection was largely inaccessible for decades; a major restoration completed in 2016, designed by the Moroccan-Canadian architect Aziza Chaouni, brought the building back while carefully preserving its historic character.