أما المخطوطات التي جمعت منذ سنة 1988 في ما سُمي بدار صدام للمخطوطات التي نقلت إليها مخطوطات المتحف العراقي وأخرى لبعض كبار الأسر العلمية العراقية فقد بلغ عددها أكثر من أربعين ألف مخطوطة بينها مخطوطات فريدة لا أخوات لها، ومخطوطات قرآنية منسوخة بأقلام خطاطين لامعين من مختلف العصور منها مخطوطة تضم سورة قريش على حبة أرز، وكان باحثون عراقيون قد تولوا فهرسة هذه المخطوطات وتثبيت نماذج منها.
What was known as the Saddam Manuscript Centre, founded in 1988, had assembled a large collection of manuscripts, including the manuscripts from the Iraqi Museum and others belonging to leading Iraqi learned families. The total ultimately amounted to over 40 000 manuscripts, including some that were unique, no other copies being known to exist. The collection also contained manuscripts of the Koran that were written by renowned calligraphers from various historical periods, including one manuscript with Sura 106 (“Quraysh”) inscribed on a grain of rice. Iraqi researchers had undertaken the task of preparing an index of these manuscripts determining how many copies of them there were.