'Islamesque: The Forgotten Craftsmen Who Built Europe's Medieval Monuments' by Diana Darke publishes

In this groundbreaking volume, Diana Darke (Oriental Studies, 1974). explores the evidence embedded in medieval monasteries, churches and castles, to finally acknowledge the contribution of the Muslim craftsmen behind these masterpieces. Here, she tells us about how embracing challenges and forging her own path has shaped her life and career, from her time at Wadham up to the publication of this pioneering volume.

Diana was among the first mixed cohort of students to matriculate at Wadham in 1974. As a first-year year student of German and Philosophy, she took a leap of faith when she made the choice to change to Arabic Studies. Diana had originally elected to study German in part because many of her family members were Germanists. However, she wanted a new challenge and had always been interested in the birthplace of civilisation. Wadham allowed Diana to change courses after completing Prelims in her first year. Her advice, based on her own experience, is to take a risk – you never know where it might lead you!

Diana had gone somewhat against the tide before that point, when she applied to Wadham. Her teachers advised her not to apply to one of the mixed colleges because they would be harder to get into. But it was a mixed college, and specifically Wadham, that she wanted to go to. She explains that in those days all you had to go on was the Oxford prospectus that had a couple of short paragraphs for each college. Wadham described itself as ‘forward-looking and liberal’, which none of the other colleges did. Diana immediately thought, 'this is the college for me'.

Arabic Studies was an established course at Oxford but at that time, travel was not part of the degree. If you wanted to speak the language locally, you had to organise it yourself, so Diana did! Without being able to speak the language at all, she went to Egypt. She had huge expectations and Egypt lived up to all of them – it was a fascinating part of the world that she wanted to know more about. She certainly achieved this, working in and travelling to every corner of it.

However, it was time spent in Turkey that brought Diana to writing. She had been on holiday there, despite being warned that it was a dangerous place that she shouldn’t go to by herself and certainly shouldn’t drive through. Diana found the opposite to be true and experienced Turkey as an incredible country. It was not a well-known destination in the mid-80s and there were no guidebooks, so Diana decided to write one. Her first book was a guidebook to Turkey that encouraged others to travel there.

Diana continued to embrace challenges, which, with twists and turns along the way, contributed to the trajectory of her writing career. Against all advice, but sponsored by her first employer, GCHQ, she drove to Lebanon to attend the long Arabic course at the FCO’s diplomatic service school. This turned out to a wise choice because Syria and Jordan were safe havens during the Lebanon civil war and Diana was able to get to know these countries very well. It was when she was evacuated from that school that she drove back through Turkey on her own. So, one thing leads to another.

Again, Diana trusted her instincts when she bought a house in Damascus despite being urged not to. This decision led her to discovering and writing about architecture and the influence of Islamic architecture in Europe, which is her main subject now.

It was when she became involved in the influences on European architecture that Diana’s time at Wadham shaped her future direction. Her book, Stealing from the Saracens: How Islamic Architecture Shaped Europe, is a history of Islamic architectural influence on Europe’s cathedrals, palaces and monuments. Diana had always been aware that Christopher Wren was a Wadham alumnus. The cover of ‘Stealing from the Saracens’ shows the inside of St Paul’s Cathedral because Wren himself said that what we call the Gothic style should rightly be called the Saracen style. He was the first person to notice this but he did not draw attention to it. He wrote of it in only private correspondence, not in a published work, and so it became forgotten. However, Diana believed that for Wren to have expressed this view towards the end of his life, it must have been based on extensive study. ‘Stealing from the Saracens’ pursues that line, examining Wren’s theory and taking it through to the logical conclusion.

Diana’s new book, Islamesque: The Forgotten Craftsmen Who Built Europe's Medieval Monuments, publishes on 21 November. She describes it as, ‘by far the most important and significant thing I've ever written, because it completely upends the European art history world.’ The discoveries Diana made during her research have genuinely surprised her and she feels they may not be popular. The book’s title, 'Islamesque', is a new word that she came up with for the 21st century, to challenge the 19th century European concept of Romanesque architecture, which is what preceded Gothic. She explains: ‘We have never questioned where this style of Romanesque came from. European art historians have considered it remarkable how suddenly, these incredible vaulting techniques appeared, and how this new decorative repertoire appeared. But in architecture nothing just pops out like a miracle birth.’

Once she started really digging deeply, Diana found that not only the styles were from influences in the Islamic world, but also the master builders themselves were overwhelmingly Muslim. During the key century, between 1100 and 1200, the Muslim world was about two centuries ahead of Europe. Europe was very backward at that time, and the Muslim craftsmen had a very deep understanding of geometry and mathematics and so they understood about vaulting. As their own Golden Age in Andalusia, Sicily and Baghdad began to disintegrate, Muslim master masons and carpenters went to work instead for new Christian masters and bishops, who employed them for the simple reason that they were the best. Similarly, Christopher Wren had said that he used Saracen vaulting in St Paul's, because it was the best.

Nobody could build stone vaulting except Muslims who understood geometry and who were literate and numerate at a time when Christian craftsman were not. It took two or three centuries for them to catch up with their Muslim counterparts. Despite this, in literature, there is only mention of the ‘anonymous builders’ until, suddenly, a Christian’s name can be put on it. Diana has uncovered an extraordinary amount of evidence of the Muslim craftsmen’s contribution. As she says: 'there is so, so much once you start looking for it and you can train your eye to then see it and all the evidence is there embedded in the buildings themselves. It’s hiding in plain sight in the buildings and in the decorative repertoire, because nobody else could do that at that time'.

Diana has traced this all the way back to the Fatimids of Egypt (the founders of Cairo), who ruled in Sicily for 300 years until the Normans came, and to Andalusia, where Arab Muslims from Syria ruled for nearly 800 years. The Normans took the styles and the craftsmen back to France and then into Britain.

It has never been acknowledged that what we think of as medieval European architecture, the foundation for all future European styles, began with the skills of the Muslims. This is the first book that has presented the evidence. This fully illustrated and fully footnoted volume involved the author in extensive travel to see Romanesque cathedrals and abbeys and monasteries. As Diana discovered, ‘it’s all there, you see the same things again in every single one. And you think, my goodness, there it is. And it just hasn't been recognized.’

Diana has been working in this field since 2019 and ‘Islamesque’ is a kind of sister volume to ‘Stealing from the Saracens’. However, 'Islamesque' is a pioneering work that looks much more deeply at the craftsmen themselves and at the Romanesque period rather than the Gothic.

When asked what she took away from her time at Wadham, Diana reflects:

‘I think what I learned was that it's very important to be your own person, not to follow the herd. And to do what you believe to be right, whether it's popular or unpopular, whether you think it's going to make people like you or not like you, I think you must be true to yourself. And if you are lucky enough to find a subject or a passion that really moves you, then you should most definitely concentrate on that and develop it in the most productive way that you can. I think of that almost as an obligation. I feel that because I've been so fortunate in my own lifetime in the things I've been able to experience, the places I've been able to visit and the people I've been able to meet in all these different countries, I think I feel a genuine obligation to maximize that all that experience and put it out in a in a readable form that people can digest and hopefully, gain some extra insights through.’

Find out more about Diana’s research and the evidence embedded in medieval monasteries, palaces, castles and cathedrals across Europe at the following events:

The Hidden Science in Europe’s Great Cathedrals’ at the Royal Institution on 23 November.

A book launch and special event moderated by Tharik Hussain at Yunus Emre Institute in London, 28 November at 7pm.

An Oxford Literary Festival talk on 1 April 2025, 12pm at Rewley House, Wellington Square, Oxford.