Remnants of antiquity were a powerful presence in the medieval Mediterranean, where the vestiges of the past served as evocative reminders of great empires and civilizations. Their subsequent reuse across the sea confirmed visually the conceptualization of the Mediterranean as an ecological, economic, and cultural unit in the medieval period. The circulation of people, goods, technologies, and ideas provided the impetus for but also was the product of a shared visual culture. A particularly ubiquitous manifestation of this shared culture was the integration of ancient spolia, or reused architectural elements, into public structures. The use of spoils from the ancient past constituted a common visual language or koine among cultures across the sea that appropriated antiquity to highlight the power, longevity, or legitimacy of a medieval ruler, dynasty, or empire. Forged through cultural contact and mixing, the koine brought together a mutually intelligible vocabulary that crossed confessional lines and united cultures across the sea in a shared appreciation of the ancient past. Participation in this Mediterranean visual koine was of particular significance for the Mamluk dynasty, whose presence in this region was precarious in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. This paper will argue that the integration of the Mamluks into the Mediterranean—its politics, economy, and culture—was essential for the identity formation of these former slaves from the Caucasus and Central Asia. The Mamluks employed ancient pharaonic spolia to connect themselves to their capital in Egypt and the people they ruled. References to an ancient Egyptian past highlighted a continuous line of succession from the pharaohs and conferred legitimacy on these foreign rulers. The use of ancient Roman spolia had global rather than localized understandings; through the incorporation of Roman materials into their architectural structures, the Mamluks announced their Mediterranean presence and belonging, turning to the west rather than the east for meaningful cultural referents. This Mediterranean integration forged an identity for the Mamluks that differentiated them from other Muslim polities while connecting them to the rich historical traditions and common visual language that united cultures across the sea throughout the Middle Ages.