“Arab-Norman” PALERMO

In 2015, seven of Palermo’s major monuments (Royal Palace and Palatine Chapel, Zisa Palace, Palermo Cathedral, Church of San Giovanni degli Eremiti, Church of Santa Maria dell’Ammiraglio, Church of San Cataldo, and Admiral’s Bridge) as well as the Cathedral churches of Monreale and Cefalù were included in the UNESCO World Heritage list as they are considered an outstanding example of the socio-cultural syncretism among Western, Islamic, and Byzantine cultures during the Norman kingdom of Sicily (1130-1194 AD). Today, these monuments are considered the crown jewel of Sicilian architecture, attracting thousands of tourists every year. This cultural koiné is also reflected in the mixture of terms from Italian, Arabic, French and Latin still in use today. The aim of this glossary of technical terms, in which each term is accompanied by a definition in the three languages – Italian, English, and French – is to help tourist guides, interpreters, translators, linguistic mediators and experts in the field of Architecture and Building Engineering to communicate in the correct way the “Arab-Norman” architecture of Palermo, allowing to make comparisons with other evidences of the same cultural expressions located in other countries of the Mediterranean Basin, which are part of “iHERITAGE. ICT Mediterranean Platform for UNESCO Cultural Heritage” project.

Martina Famoso Graduated in 2012 in Building Engineering-Architecture from the Università degli Studi di Palermo, the following year she obtained an MSc at the Politecnico di Milano in “Sustainable Buildings and Infrastructures”. Between 2014 and 2015, she worked as Blast Engineer for the European Commission, before moving to the UK were she worked for 5 years as Revit Technician and Structural Engineer. She is now a PhD student in Art, Architecture and Planning at the Università degli Studi di Palermo, curriculum “Sustainable Architecture and Design – Human Centered Approach” where she was involved in the Visual Lab of the iHERITAGE project.