Some historical discoveries emerge from archaeological excavations. Others are found buried in archives, forgotten by generations. Such is the story of the Map of Fayoum of 1844 – 1260 AH, a remarkable document that disappeared from public knowledge for many years.
Published only once, in 1950, in an edition of merely one thousand copies, the map never entered mainstream historical or scientific discourse. Today, through this article, we are pleased to make a high-quality digital scan of this extraordinary document freely available to scholars, researchers, students, and all those interested in the history of Fayoum and Egyptian cartography.

The map was published by Ali Shafei Bey in 1950 as part of the centenary celebrations of Muhammad Ali Pasha’s public works. Accompanying an atlas of hydraulic and engineering projects undertaken during Muhammad Ali’s reign, it stood apart from the other maps in the collection. More than a technical survey, it carries an extraordinary story of creation, disappearance, rediscovery, and survival.

A Vision for Mapping Fayoum

In 1840, Muhammad Ali Pasha ordered the creation of a comprehensive map of the Fayoum province, one of Egypt’s most fertile and strategically important regions. The task was entrusted to Linant de Bellefonds, Director General of Roads and Bridges and one of the leading engineers in the service of the Egyptian state. According to Linant, Egyptian engineers trained under his supervision conducted the survey. The resulting work was exceptionally detailed. The original survey map was prepared at a scale of 1:10,000, allowing a level of precision unprecedented for Fayoum. A reduced version was later prepared for presentation to Muhammad Ali himself.

The surviving map records villages, canals, drains, reservoirs, bridges, cultivated areas, administrative boundaries, basin embankments, and topographical measurements. It is arguably the earliest scientifically surveyed map of the entire Fayoum province.

Lepsius, Erbkam, and the Survey of Fayoum

Independent evidence for the survey survives in the diary of the German surveyor Georg Gustav Erbkam, a member of Karl Richard Lepsius’s famous Prussian expedition. On 29 June 1843, while camped near the pyramid of Hawara, Erbkam recorded a visit from an architect named Nascimbene, employed by Muhammad Ali and engaged in surveying and leveling the Fayoum. Nascimbene reported dramatic measurements between Medinet al-Fayoum and Lake Qarun that differed substantially from previous estimates by Linant.

This brief diary entry is highly significant. It independently confirms that large-scale surveying operations were actively underway in Fayoum during the very years when the map was being produced.  Today we know that Lake Qarun lies below sea level, but in the early nineteenth century this was far from obvious. The elevation profile preserved on the map records a difference of more than sixty meters between Medinet and the lake, demonstrating the scientific sophistication of the survey.

The Vanishing

The most remarkable part of the story begins after the map was completed. Linant recounted that a painter in the Ministry of Public Works had been assigned to prepare a fair copy of the survey. When illness prevented him from working in the office, the original map and its copy were sent to his home. Soon afterward, the painter died.
His widow immediately left the residence and both the original map and the copy disappeared. Years later, when Linant returned to a senior position in the Ministry of Public Works after 1854, orders were given to search for the draft map of Fayoum so that it could be redrawn. Unfortunately, Linant found only scattered fragments of it. For during his tenure as Inspector General, all the ministry’s archives, drawings, maps, files, and other records had been placed in cotton sacks and thrown carelessly into damp storehouses that no one visited. Rats and other insects gnawed through them, destroying a large portion of these useful documents, which had cost the state treasury vast sums of money and required a great deal of time to produce. ….The Fayoum map appeared lost forever.

An Unexpected Return

Several years later, after Linant had retired from government service in 1866, an unexpected visitor was coming from His Highness Prince Halim [ Muhammad Abd al-Halim Pasha 1831 – 1894, grandson of Mohammed Ali ].  He arrived carrying a handmade Arabic map of Fayoum. Linant immediately recognized it as the long-lost map of the Ministry of Public Works. At first he considered having the man arrested, but it quickly became clear that the visitor had acquired the map innocently and knew nothing of its history. Linant purchased the map and reclaimed what he believed to be state property. Meanwhile, His Highness the Governor wanted to have a map of Fayoum made.  In order to save time and since it was not possible to make a more complete or better map than this, I presented it to His Highness the Governor, especially since it was owned by the government.  Later Linant submitted the map once again to the authorities…Then it vanished for a second time.

The Second Rediscovery

Kamel Othman Ghaleb Pasha, then Inspector General of Upper Egypt Irrigation, discovered the map in the archives of the Egyptian National Library  in 1936, where it had lain forgotten and unidentified. The map survived in remarkable condition. Written entirely in Arabic and beautifully colored, it differed from most contemporary surveys associated with European engineers. It clearly stated that it had been prepared on the orders of Muhammad Ali Pasha. Recognizing its importance, Ghaleb Pasha arranged for three copies to be made including one for the Fayoum irrigation inspection, one for the Royal Geographical Society, and one for the Ministry of Works of all canals. Finally, in 1950, the Royal Egyptian Society for Historical Studies , headed by His Excellency Taher Pasha printed a thousand copies of this important document have been printed.

The Map Copy That Survived

One of those thousand printed copies eventually embarked on an unexpected journey of its own. Around 1979–1980, in the book market near Abdin Square in Cairo, German geographer Matthias Rebentisch came across a beautifully produced Arabic map of Fayoum offered by a friendly bookseller. Originally, Matthias’s interest was limited to the attractive map itself. However, the bookseller insisted that the map should not be separated from its original case and accompanying book, explaining that they belonged together. The volume also contained a map of the Qattara Depression, one of Rebentisch’s favorite research subjects, which ultimately convinced him to buy the complete set, little did he know that he had purchased one of the rare thousand copies printed in 1950, preserving one of the most remarkable cartographic documents ever produced for the Fayoum. More than four decades later, that chance encounter in a Cairo bookshop made it possible to produce the high-resolution digital edition presented in this article below, ensuring that this long-forgotten map can once again be studied by historians, geographers, archaeologists, and everyone interested in the history of Fayoum.

Historical Significance

The importance of the map extends far beyond its dramatic history. It represents the earliest known surveyed map of Fayoum and preserves an unparalleled record of the province before the major transformations of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Its accuracy is astonishing, though its western part still suffering the distortion of the false triangulation that Jomard took at Qasr Qarun and which entered the map of the French Expedition ( Band 6: Jacotin, Antoine : Carte topographique de L’Égypte et de plusieurs parties des pays limitrophes: levée pendant l’expédition de l’armée française par les ingénieurs-géographes …, Paris, 1828 )

The map

By Matthais Rebentisch and Mahmoud Kamel. Please feel free to contact us if you require any additional information about the map.

References:
(Ali Shafei Bey (Directeur Général des projects des Déserts au Ministère des Travaux Publics et Membre de la Société Royal d’études historiques)
in: Centenaire de Mohammed Ali. Grand Traveaux Publics étudiés et éxécutés sous l’époque de Mohammed Ali El-Kebir. Al-Maaref, Le Caire 1950, p74, 75)