Behind the Symbols: Islamic Flags and Stories from the Sea in Medici Tuscany
Sinopie Museum
20 June – 21 September 2025

The Museo delle Sinopie hosts this previously unseen temporary exhibition organised by the Opera della Primaziale Pisana, under the patronage of the Scuola Normale Superiore and the University of Pisa, with the support and contribution of Fondazione Pisa, Rotary Pisa and Rotary Pisa Galilei. The exhibition has been curated by a scientific committee composed of Andrea Addobbati, Gianfranco Adornato, Stefano Bruni and Giuseppe Petralia.

The exhibition brings together rare Islamic banners from the 16th and 17th centuries. These flags, seized in battle from Barbary and Ottoman ships by the Order of Saint Stephen, have since been preserved in the Church of Santo Stefano dei Cavalieri, which is currently closed for restoration. This is the first time these banners and artefacts are being presented to the public accompanied by a scientific and narrative display designed to make them accessible and meaningful to a broad audience.

Among the items on display are Turkish flags, Eastern weaponry, Arabic manuscripts and illustrative materials such as prints, drawings and original documents. The exhibition route is enriched by interpretative panels that present the early modern Mediterranean as a fluid space of interaction between powers, religions and cultures. These military symbols are shown not merely as trophies of conflict, but as fragments of a much broader and more complex network of relationships that Pisa maintained with the Arab-Islamic world from the Middle Ages onwards.

These connections extend beyond the exhibition halls of the Museo delle Sinopie, interweaving with the history of the city itself, which has long absorbed and reinterpreted influences from the Islamic world. Starting in the medieval period, Pisa was a centre of intense and ongoing cultural exchanges, the traces of which remain visible in its architecture and art. One need only think of the polychrome inlays, the iconic white and black bands, pointed arches or the ellipsoidal dome of the Cathedral, the presbytery floor of the Baptistery, or the Islamic bronze Griffin now housed in the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo. Further echoes can be found in the Monumental Cemetery, where the statue of Leonardo Fibonacci – the renowned Pisan mathematician who studied in Algeria and introduced Arabic numerals to Europe – stands as a symbolic reminder of the continuous dialogue between Eastern and Western knowledge. Even the façades of nearby churches such as San Sisto and Santa Cecilia preserve glazed ceramic basins of Islamic design, testament to a decorative tradition which, with the arrival of migrant artisans, became a locally produced craft highly valued across Europe.

Entrance with tickets:
SINOPIE MUSEUM
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