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John Osterman
An arid landscape with flat sand dotted with green bushes and small trees in the foreground. In the distance and on the horizon are brown and rust-colored rock plateaus and formations, some extending thousand of feet high. The sky is a pale blue.

Sand in the Couscous

(WashPost) Mauritania's ancient libraries could be lost to the expanding desert

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It’s not everyday that Mauritania makes it into the Washington Post, which today has a beautiful photo essay about the town Chinguetti and its libraries. Several towns in Mauritania were important stops along the trans-Saharan trade routes and were vibrant centers for trade and scholarship. Chinguetti is one of them; Oulata is another. I made it to neither, I’m afraid. But this WashPost piece was nice to see.

You should check it out too.

Mauritania’s ancient libraries could be lost to the expanding desert