Arches. 
120 GRAND CAIRO. 
were useless to write a particular description 
of it'. The most interesting parts of it to an 
English traveller, as connected with the history 
of the architecture of his country, are the 
splendid remains of buildings erected by the 
antient Caliphs of Egypt, particularly the edifice 
vulgarly called '' Joseph\s Palace,'' built by Sultan 
Salah ed din, or Saladine, whose name was 
Pointed Joseph'^. Here we beheld those pointed arches^ 
which, although constructed soon after the 
middle of the twelfth century, by a fanatic 
Moslem^, (now ranked among the Mohammedan 
Saints, for his rigid adherence to all the pre- 
judices of Islam*,) certain English antiquaries 
(l) " Aloft, and neere the top of the mountaine, against the south 
end of the citie, stands the Castle, (once the stately mansion of the 
Mamaluck Sultans, and destroyed by Selvmns) ascended unto by one 
way onelj', and that hewne out of the rocke, which rising leisurely 
with easie step*;, and spacious distances, (though of a great height) 
maybe on hor>.ehacke without difficullie mounted." Sandys' Travels, 
p. 122- Loud. 1637. The reader may he referred to Lord f^akntia's 
Travels for the he^t account of the place ; and, above all, for the ac- 
curate and beautiful views of the buildings iu it, which his lordship 
published, after Mr. Sitlt'% designs made upon the spot. See vol. III. 
p. 372. i(c. Lond. 180y. See also Nivbuhr, vol. \. p. 59. Edin. 1792. 
(2) Niebuhr, ibid. 
(3) " In a fanatic age, himself a fanatic." Gibbon, vol. XI. p. WO. 
Lond. 1807. 
(4) " All profane science was the object of his aversion." Ibtd. 
p. 113. 
