The collection comprises twenty-nine Islamic manuscripts acquired in Kashgar, Yarkand, Yangi Hisar and Turfan in the Xinjiang Uyghur autonomous region of the People’s Republic of China. On the basis of the texts and the physical appearance of the manuscripts, however, it appears that part of them originate from major centres of Islamic learning further West, such as Samarqand and Bukhara. One manuscript belongs to the ethnic Chinese Hui tradition.

The little collection appears to reflect the religious interests of the educated elite of the region with texts on Islamic dogma, exegesis of the Qur’an, fiqh, Friday sermons, prayers, Sufi poetry, Arabic grammar and astronomy. It would not be too far-fetched to assume that the manuscripts were used in the curriculum of local madrasas until the early decades of the twentieth century. The languages used are Arabic, Persian and Eastern Turkic. There is a marked preponderance of Turkic in the manuscripts of Xinjiang origin as compared with the manuscripts from the Samarqand-Bukhara area.