Islam in Europe. 1000–1250

Exhibition

The treasuries of European churches, including the Hildesheim Cathedral Treasury (a UNESCO World Heritage Site), preserve numerous artefacts from regions where the Islamic faith exercised a formative influence. Based on these objects, the grand special exhibition at the Hildesheim Cathedral Museum sheds light on shared achievements and cultural entanglements. With outstanding works on loan from international lenders, including pieces from Florence, London, Paris, and Vienna, it offers visitors a unique opportunity to explore a history that has direct bearing on contemporary concerns.

Córdoba, Palermo, Cairo, and Constantinople were gleaming metropolises where business and trade, the sciences and the arts flourished. Precious rock crystal vessels, silken fabrics, carved ivories, and translations of scientific literature reached Central Europe from areas where Islam was the dominant faith. This migration of objects and transmission of knowledge and technology resulted in an interweaving of cultures. It forged connections across boundaries of creed and language and vast geographical distances, from today’s Iraq and Iran through North Africa and Spain all the way to Central Europe. Preserved in church treasuries, the objects bear witness to how much these diverse cultures had in common in the era between 1000 and 1250.