3-070-573 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Sketches in Cairo, 1883. '...Sketches of the picturesque native quarter of the Egyptian capital city, of the Bedouins' tents near Ghizeh, and of the boatmen's cottages on the banks of the Nile...The street view...is a good example of the characteristic fashions of old Cairene architecture; with its ground-floor shops, which are mere stone-built recesses in the front wall,...its plastered upper storeys, jutting out upon corbels, and supporting the projection of latticed windows, often handsomely carved in wood; the overshadowing penthouses to exclude the blazing sun of Egypt; and the frequent minaret or cupola, belonging to a sacred edifice. It is in the eastern part of Cairo, quite away from the Nile, between the city gate called the Bab-el-Futah and the fortified palace or citadel at the foot of Mount Mulkattam, that these narrow, old-fashioned streets of the purely Mussulman town are to be found. Here is the Ghoriyeh, with its stately assemblage of mosques,...here are the several bazaars of the coppersmiths, the silversmiths and jewellers, the shoemakers and leather-sellers, the armourers and cutlers, the dealers in cotton goods, the- sugar-dealers, the druggists, and other trades'. From "Illustrated London News", 1883.