Egypt’s Museum of Islamic Art in Cairo presents introductory video to its important objects

After years of renovation of the available collection, the museum opened its doors in January 2017.

Located in the heart of the Arab world to display approximately 1,700 objects, MIA owns one of the most important and largest collections in the world. 

Erected in 1903 in Bab el- Kalq, this museum is considered one of the greatest museums in the world. It is made up of one large floor with plenty of exhibits. 

The museum's right wing includes many artefacts from different Islamic periods. 

It contains also wood panels, gold dinars, ceramic dishes, beautiful jewellery, ivory, boxes and whole doors. The museum's left wing includes in addition to the Egyptian Islamic art, Persian and Turkish artefacts. 

The collection in this section includes surgical instruments, scales, sand clocks, astrolabes and compasses to determine Ka’ba direction to help Muslims pray. 
This museum was closed in January 2014 after a bomb attack on the Cairo police directorate. 

Relocated here in 1903 from its original home at the Fatimid Mosque of al-Hakim, this building is of tremendous importance, as it is the oldest building purposefully built to display Islamic art. 

The museum's collection was accumulated from various sources, including excavations, purchases, gifts and important Islamic monuments in Cairo. 

Consequently, the museum owns impressive ceramics, textiles, metalwork, carved wood and stone artefacts that illustrate the material culture of Egypt from the 7th-19th centuries, as well as the largest group of enamelled and gilded Mamluk mosque lamps in the world. 


The museum now uses a chronological approach to arrange its collection beginning with the Umayyad era, before continuing with the Abbasid/Tulunid, Fatimid, Ayyubid, Mamluk and Ottoman periods. 

The second half of the tour includes artefacts from Ottoman Turkey, Persia and Andalus (Muslim Spain), as well as thematic sections, such as funerary art, epigraphy, calligraphy, carpets and textiles, geometry, astronomy and medicine. 

The museum is one large floor, yet has enough exhibits for at least two hours of interesting browsing. The museum's interior was designed to depend on the natural light, which makes it one of the most comfortable museums in Egypt to visit.