Recently an article — “Look at art for the deep connection between Europe and Islam” — appeared in the Guardian. The author, Kenan Malik, sometimes a critic of, and sometimes a sly apologist for, Islam, claimed that there was a deep respect in Renaissance Europe for the world of Islam. “Embodied in the Renaissance view […]
UK’s Guardian claims Arabic in Renaissance painting shows “deep connection between Europe and Islam”
The writing in the halos is actually not Arabic, but Pseudo-Kufic: Renaissance-era Europeans thought that the Arabic script was that which was used in Jesus’ time, so they thought that they were lending some historical authenticity to their representations by including some characters that resembled Arabic. That is all that is going on in Gentile […]