The Italian ambassador, Armando Sanguini, has said that the current exhibition, "Islam in Sicily" at the Murabha Palace in the King Abdul Aziz Historical Center in Riyadh is well worth a visit. It highlights a little known model of cooperation and tolerance in the Mediterranean world. The exhibition is open until Feb. 25.
Unlike the case of Muslim Spain, both the Arab world and Europe have long forgotten the glories of Arab Sicily (Saqilliyah) - or indeed that it existed at all. Yet for two centuries, the emirate of Palermo, still the island's capital, was the jewel in the Arab crown. During its heyday, the city one of the richest in the Arab world, profiting from Mediterranean trade and outshining such other cities as Damascus, Baghdad or any of those in Spain. Arab travellers and writers flocked there. In 973, the eminent Arab traveler and explorer Ibn Hawqal described it as "the city of the 300 mosques."
Arab travellers continued to flock to the island even after it was captured by the Normans in the mid-eleventh century. The Arab traveler, Ibn Jubayr, described Sicily as "an earthly paradise, a land of rebirth."
One reason was that the Norman rulers, in a rare example of tolerance for the period, gave to Muslims, Jews, Catholic and Orthodox Christians complete religious freedom. The royal guard was composed entirely of Muslims; Muslim crafstmen built Christian churches and palaces, most notably the Palatine Chapel in the Royal Palace in Palermo and the nearby 12th century Ziza Palace built near the end of the Norman period when the Norman-Arab style of architecture had reached the peak of its development and sophistication. The name "Ziza" is derived from the Arabic "Al-Azizah," meaning "The Strong and Mighty." It survives in the Sicilian phrase "azzizatu," meaning "well-dressed."
Other relics of Sicily's Arab past abound. On the columns that flank the main entrance to Palermo Cathedral are verses from the Koran. The city's museum contains an impressive collection of Islamic artifacts from the Mediterranean basin. They are not only physical relics. In its day, Sicily - even more so then Muslim Spain - was where the Muslim and Christian worlds met, intermingled and flourished. There are a number of words which came into European languages from Arabic via Sicily. The "Emir al Bahr" (Prince of the Sea) was the commander of Arab Sicily's navy. The conquering Normans retained all the Arab military structures and the word moved into Norman French as "amiral" and into English as "admiral."
"Islam in Sicily" provides a glimpse of the social, cultural and artistic links between Sicily and the Arab world. Acting as a bridge between East and West, North and South, the island represents a unique point of contact between various civilizations and through the centuries was able to achieve significant advances in the fields of art and culture. Eight audio and video installations, animation, documentaries and sound recordings illustrate the strong similarities between Arab culture and that of Sicily.
Accompanying the exhbition is a catalog highlighting the historical aspects of Sicily's relations with Islam. Centuries-old Arab architecture, Arabic calligraphy and irrigation systems, among others, take up this theme through audi-visual aids. Ten volumes on Islamic architecture and cultural traditions are also on display. These books written by Abu Hussein Al-Jubeir describe the traditions, language and cultural heritage of Sicilians from the 9th to the 12th centuries. They show that Sicily had close cultural relations with the countries of the Maghreb, - Tunisia, Algieria and Morocco.
"The exhibition clearly shows the legacy of the Arab period which is visible in many parts of Italy," Ambassador Sanguini said. Italy, he pointed out, not only contains a large number of mosques but the largest one in Europe is in Rome.
The thrust of the exhibition is to drive home the point that two centuries of Arab rule brought the vitality of Islamic arts and sciences to Sicily. Palermo became an international market, a cultural crossroads where traders from Christian Italian cities were as welcome as Muslim merchants from northern Africa and the East. The footprints of Muslims are still visible in the Arab-founded village of Soutera. Ancient buildings of Arab and Norman French origin, with a coating of later provincial baroque facades, as on the old Romanesque church, are still seen here.
The picture of the Ziza Palace which was commissioned by the Norman leader William, son of King Roger II, shows the contributions made by Arab designers and craftsmen built this architectural gem in Sicily. Accordingly, it exhibits many distinctive Islamic features, including its name, which originates from the Arabic phrase "Dar al-Aziz", meaning the noble or strong house. In addition the Ziza exemplifies the confluence of cultures so typical of the Norman period (1061-1194) in Sicily, by weaving Muslim, Roman, and Byzantine stylistic influences and creating a unique period in the island's architectural history
However, the spread of Islam to the north and west and potentially into the heart of Europe was never a roller-coaster ride. Its advance into the region was thwarted by the Byzantine Empire for the next 700 hundred years until the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Yet there was another road open to early Islam: across the easily navigable distance from North Africa to the island of Sicily and then up the Italian mainland. It is reported that fishermen from Sicily and Tunisia met across the deep seas and shared an Arabian meal of couscus which is now a popular delicacy in Italy.
After Sicily was retaken by the Normans in 1091 the island remained a paragon of tolerance. Roger the Norman cared little about race or religion; he surrounded himself with ability, whether it spoke Greek, Latin or Arabic.
There was a flowering of Arab-Norman or Muslim-Christian culture. In his Christian kingdom some of the highest offices were held by Muslims. Roger's own fleet was built and commanded by Muslims. Arabic was the language of science in the 12th century.
Arabic commentaries on the works of Greek masters influenced European thought, and treatises about medicine and science were translated from Arabic into Latin and then made their way north into Europe.
The Arab tendency to pepper the language with poetry took hold in Italian literature and even Dante was exposed to Arab works which may have influenced La Divina Commedia. Sicily was a conduit for the transmission of Arab knowledge up into Italy and it was this intercourse with Arab ideas that some say marked the beginning of the Renaissance.
The Italian ambasador hopes that the exhibition will act as a bridge of understanding between Italy and the Islamic world and so discredit the theory of a clash of civilizations propounded by Professor Samuel Huntington
The exhibition has been organized by the Italian Embassy in Riyadh in cooperation with the King Abdul Aziz Foundation for Research and Archives and the General Presidency for Youth Welfare.
