Wales: an exhibition traces the little-known history of Welsh Muslims

The Pierhead Building in Cardiff is hosting an exhibition that lifts the veil on more than a century of Muslim presence in Wales. The “Islam in Wales” project, born from a collaboration between Cardiff University and the local Muslim community, traces this history largely ignored in school textbooks.

At the heart of this historical fresco, we discover the first Somali and Yemeni sailors who, from the 1860s, dropped anchor in Welsh ports. The exhibition focuses in particular on a key moment: the inauguration of the country’s first mosque in Cardiff in 1947. Yellowed photos, handwritten letters and personal stories weave the thread of a history intimately linked to the maritime and industrial development of the city. region.

Professor Sophie Gilliat-Ray, who directs the Center for the Study of Islam in the United Kingdom, emphasizes the importance of preserving this collective memory. “These communities have helped shape modern Welsh identity, yet their history has remained in the shadows for too long,” she explains. This heritage recognition process highlights how the port districts of Tiger Bay and Butetown have become, over the decades, emblematic multicultural crossroads of industrial Wales, where local maritime traditions have mixed with influences from the East.

The project is part of a wider movement to re-evaluate British history and its dominant narratives. It demonstrates a growing desire by cultural institutions to highlight the contributions of communities long marginalized in official historiography. Beyond its heritage dimension, the exhibition raises the essential question of the transmission of this memory to new generations and its integration into the contemporary Welsh national narrative.