A library at the Presidential Complex in the capital Ankara, set to open later this year, will serve as a home of ancient manuscripts and carry out restoration works.
Donations of books for the new library have poured in from all across the country. Restorers are currently working on a valuable trove of nearly 1,000 manuscripts donated to the library by author Mehmet Şevket Eygi. A book restoration facility will also be a part of the presidential library.
The construction of the library is largely complete. It will house around 5 million books. More than 1.5 million books have so far been collected. Apart from Eygi, the family of late composer Cinuçen Tanrıkorur also donated his entire archives to the library. Prominent historian, professor İlber Ortaylı also donated his personal collection of books to the library. The library will include the book collections of late thinker Cemil Meriç, politician Hasan Celal Güzel, writer Şefik Can and founder of Enderun Publishing İsmail Özdoğan. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan himself has donated a handwritten copy of the Quran to the library and will likely donate his larger book collection to the library.
The library will host separate sections dedicated to children, students and researchers and will give readers an opportunity to read collector's items, rare books, manuscripts, ancient decrees as well as to browse ancient maps, photographs, stamps and drawings. The library will also have a restaurant and cafes and a small theater to screen films for children. Covering a sprawling 300,000 square meters, the Presidential Complex is frequently dubbed as the "house of the nation" by President Erdoğan and he works to make it more accessible to the public. A mosque inside the complex is among the areas accessible to the public while a large hall hosts events like summits and conferences. Erdoğan moved into the new complex in October 2014. The iconic presidential mansion in the eponymous Beştepe district of the capital is located within the Atatürk Forest Farm, a vast protected forest that hosts a large farm founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Republic of Turkey.