David Roberts was one of the first British artists to travel to the Middle East, providing views of the Orient that were entirely new to the British public. Roberts particularly relished painting the mosques of Cairo during his visit to Egypt in 1838. This view shows the district of Bab Zuweyleh (also known as Metawalea) with the fifteenth-century minarets of the mosque of Sultan Mu’ayyad Shaykh towering above one of the three medieval gates leading into the city. Purchased by Queen Victoria from the Royal Academy, 1840