T he handwritten books that arrived at the Palace Treasury from all over the globe when the Ottoman Empire ruled the four corners of the earth are among the most valuable items in the Topkapi Palace Museum today, as valuable perhaps as even the famous Kashoggi diamond.
The Library of Topkapi Palace Museum contains thousands of such manuscripts, housed in the Aðalar Camii, or Mosque of the Eunuchs, one of the palace’s first buildings. This building, which was in ruins at the time the palace was being converted into a museum, was restored in 1928 to house the books scattered hither and yon throughout the vast complex. With the exception of those in the Library of Ahmed III, all the books were later removed here to a building known as the Yeni Kutuphane or New Library. In 1966 the books from the Ahmed III Library were transferred here as well.