The sections of the museum relate the human history of the entire Aeolian Islands from prehistoric to classical times, and also cover vulcanology, marine history, and the paleontology of the western Mediterranean. The cathedral, which until 1916 was the central church of the Aeolian islands, existed in a smaller form since the early centuries of the Christian era. Destroyed in 838 when the whole of Sicily fell under Arab rule, it was reestablished in the 11th century, and in 1131 became a cathedral.