Searching for Islamic Manuscripts in Western Sumatra

Abstract

No original writing tradition in Minang - the language of the Minangkabau ethnic group of Western Sumatra - existed before the coming of Islam. The jawi, or Arabic Malay, Islamic writing tradition, which developed over the 17th and 18th centuries, became the main conduit of Sufi learning on Sumatra, producing manuscripts that have since become quite rare. At the beginning of the 21s t century, Irina Katkova undertook a journey to find surviving examples of this almost vanished tradition.