CAIRO — The Egyptian Textile Museum, an Ottoman-style building located at the heart of Islamic Cairo, pays homage to the country’s Christian heritage by displaying rare and ancient Coptic textiles that date from the fourth to seventh centuries CE.

The exhibition, titled “God is Love,” opened Jan. 2 in anticipation of the Coptic Christmas, which is celebrated on Jan. 7. The exhibition will run until March.

The museum’s general director, Ashraf Abol Yazeed, told Al-Monitor that the exhibition is part of the museum's efforts to tie its exhibitions to special events and festivals shared among the different religions in Egypt. “We have displayed some textiles from the Sacred Chamber of the Prophet to celebrate his birthday [in November]. [For Christmas], we organized an exhibition of Coptic textiles. Some of the works displayed show that Ancient Egyptian art influenced early Coptic art,” he said.

The textiles were found in el-Bagawat, an ancient Christian cemetery at the Kharga Oasis in southern-central Egypt. This cemetery, one of the oldest in the world, was excavated between 1907 and 1932 and many important artifacts of the early Coptic era were discovered, such as pottery and personal items such as combs, writing utensils and textiles. Some of the textiles were sent to the warehouses of the Egyptian Ministry of Antiques, and then given to the Museum of Textiles after its foundation in 2010. Other pieces from those excavations can be seen in Western museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.