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Acknowledgments

My own early explorations of Cairo’s Islamic art and architecture owed much to Richard Parker’s first edition of this book (1974), which as congenial guide and practical walking companion served well the distances of time and space. It is for me therefore a great pleasure, in expanding and updating subsequent editions, to continue the original purpose of practical guiding for those who would do their own searching and wandering and for those who seek more than a bottom-line guidebook yet need less than a library.

In the thirty years of these revisions my debt for the information presented in this book is to many sources: to pioneering scholars, to mentors, to friends, and community enthusiasts, and to colleagues at the American University in Cairo (AUC)—in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s—all of whom I have cited individually in previous editions. My revisions have also continued to benefit from the ongoing research and publications of other scholars and observers in the field, and for this edition especially I acknowledge the unpublished master’s theses of AUC’s graduate program in Islamic Art and Architecture. For the person who can consult them in AUC’s Rare Books and Special Collections Library they provide much useful insight about individual buildings, periods, urban areas, and inscriptions. More specifically I wish to reiterate my thanks to Jaroslaw Dobrowolski for the sketches that animate this book; to Ola Seif for her detailed maps; to J.A. Williams for help with texts in Arabic; to Neil Hewison and Andrea El-Akshar, who have guided the text and images of this edition; and lastly to the city of Cairo, whose monuments stand as symbols of a colorful and engrossing history in neighborhoods full of charm and diversity.