The Mosque of Kaitbéy

In 1858, on the second of three trips to the Middle East that launched a highly successful career as a photographer and publisher of foreign topographic views, Francis Frith carried with him all of the equipment necessary to produce photographs on this mammoth scale: an enormous camera, sheets of glass, bottles of chemicals, and a darkroom tent in which to prepare and develop his negatives. His subjects included not only Egypt’s ancient pyramids and temples but also the country’s Islamic monuments, including the 15th-century Mosque of Qaytbay in Cairo.