Lower Egypt
Cairo Governorate
Cairo

Islamic Cairo

Islamic Cairo is the name commonly given to the core of medieval , a part of the city remarkably different from the modern Downtown district and the suburbs to the west.
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Photo: Argenberg, CC BY 4.0.
Photo: Ahmed Al.Badawy, CC BY-SA 2.0.
  • Type: Suburb
  • Description: urban district
  • Also known as: “Historic Cairo”

Places of Interest

Highlights include Al-Azhar Mosque and Bāb Zuwaylah.

Mosque
Photo: Maveric149, CC BY-SA 4.0.
, known in Egypt simply as al-Azhar, is a in , Egypt in the historic Islamic core of the city. Commissioned as the new capital of the Fatimid Caliphate in 970, it was the first mosque established in a city that eventually earned the nickname "the City of a Thousand Minarets".

Photo: JMCC1, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Bab Zuwayla or Bab Zuweila is one of three remaining gates in the city walls of historic Cairo in Egypt. It was also known as Bawabat al-Mitwali or Bab al-Mitwali.

Mosque
Photo: Berthold Werner, CC BY 3.0.
The al-Hussein Mosque or al-Husayn Mosque, also known as the Mosque of al-Imam al-Husayn and the Mosque of Sayyidna al-Husayn, is a and mausoleum of Husayn ibn Ali, originally built in 1154, and then later reconstructed in 1874.

Places in the Area

Nearby places include Downtown Cairo and Abdin.

Photo: Berthold Werner, CC BY-SA 3.0.
is the commercial heart of the modern city of . In addition to hosting the Egyptian Museum, Downtown is the convenient location of many smaller hotels, retail outlets, travel agencies and restaurants.

Suburb
Photo: ThutmoseIII, CC BY-SA 3.0.
is a suburb.

Neighborhood
Photo: Wikimedia, CC BY 2.0.
is a district in the Western Area of , . According to the district map, and the census, it is subdivided into the qisms of al-Wayli and el-Daher, or al-Zahir. Some of their better known quarters are and .

Islamic Cairo

Latitude
30.04875° or 30° 2′ 56″ north
Longitude
31.26378° or 31° 15′ 50″ east
Open location code
8G2H27X7+FG
Open­Street­Map ID
node 330154299
Open­Street­Map feature
place=­suburb
Wiki­data ID
Q1100964
This page is based on OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, and Wikivoyage.
We’d love your help improving our open data sources. Thank you for contributing.

Satellite Map

Discover Islamic Cairo from above in high-definition satellite imagery.
© Stadia Maps, Airbus DS, CNES, PlanetObserver, and Copernicus

In Other Languages

From Arabic to Western Panjabi—“Islamic Cairo” goes by many names.
  • Arabic: “القاهرة الإسلامية”
  • Arabic: “القاهرة التاريخية”
  • Arabic: “قاهرة المعز”
  • Armenian: “Իսլամական Կահիրե”
  • Asturian: “El Cairo Históricu”
  • Asturian: “El Cairu Históricu”
  • Azerbaijani: “İslam Qahirəsi”
  • Basque: “Islamdar Kairo”
  • Basque: “Islamiar Kairo”
  • Bengali: “ইসলামিক কায়রো”
  • Bosnian: “Islamski Kairo”
  • Burmese: “အစ္စလာမ်မစ် ကိုင်ရို”
  • Catalan: “El Caire Històric”
  • Chinese: “加塔伊”
  • Chinese: “开罗伊斯兰老城”
  • Chinese: “开罗古城”
  • Chinese: “格塔伊耳城”
  • Chinese: “開羅伊斯蘭老城”
  • Croatian: “Islamski Kairo”
  • Dutch: “Historisch Caïro”
  • Esperanto: “Islama Kairo”
  • Esperanto: “Islama Kvartalo de Kairo”
  • French: “Caire islamique”
  • Galician: “O Cairo Histórico”
  • German: “Historisches Kairo”
  • German: “Islamische Altstadt”
  • German: “Islamisches Kairo”
  • Greek: “Ισλαμικό Κάιρο”
  • Hausa: “Musulunci Alkahira”
  • Hebrew: “קהיר האסלאמית”
  • Hindi: “इस्लामी काहिरा”
  • Hungarian: “Az iszlám Kairó”
  • Indonesian: “Kairo Bersejarah”
  • Indonesian: “Kairo Islam”
  • Italian: “Il Cairo storica”
  • Italian: “Il Cairo storico”
  • Japanese: “カイロ旧市街”
  • Japanese: “カイロ歴史地区”
  • Macedonian: “Исламски Каиро”
  • Maithili: “इस्लामिक कायरो”
  • Malayalam: “ഇസ്ലാമിക് കെയ്‌റോ”
  • Maltese: “Belt Storika tal-Kajr”
  • Maltese: “Il-Belt Iżlamika tal-Kajr”
  • Nepali: “इस्लामिक कायरो”
  • Nepali: “इस्लामी कायरो”
  • Norwegian Bokmål: “Det islamske Kairo”
  • Norwegian: “Det islamske Kairo”
  • Persian: “قاهره اسلامی”
  • Portuguese: “Cairo histórico”
  • Portuguese: “Cairo islâmico”
  • Portuguese: “Cairo Islâmico”
  • Romanian: “Cairo islamic”
  • Romanian: “Cairoul musulman”
  • Romanian: “Islamic Cairo”
  • Russian: “Исламский Каир”
  • Scots: “Islamic Cairo”
  • Serbo-Croatian: “Islamski Kairo”
  • Slovenian: “Muslimanski Kairo”
  • Spanish: “Cairo historico”
  • Spanish: “Cairo histórico”
  • Spanish: “El Cairo historico”
  • Spanish: “El Cairo Histórico”
  • Swahili: “Islamic Cairo”
  • Swahili: “Kairo ya Kale”
  • Swedish: “Historiska Kairo”
  • Tatar: “Тарихи Каһирә”
  • Turkish: “Tarihi Kahire”
  • Turkish: “Tarihî Kahire”
  • Ukrainian: “Ісламський Каїр”
  • Ukrainian: “Історичний Каїр”
  • Urdu: “قاہرہ المعز”
  • Vietnamese: “Cairo Hồi giáo”
  • Western Panjabi: “قاہرہ المعز”

Localities in the Area

Explore places such as Qasr El Shok and El Mashhad El Husseiny.

Cairo: Must-Visit Destinations

Delve into Giza, Downtown Cairo, Ma’adi, and Old Cairo.

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About Mapcarta. Data © OpenStreetMap contributors and available under the Open Database License". Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license, except for photos, directions, and the map. Description text is based on the Wikivoyage page “Islamic Cairo”. Photo: Ahmed Al.Badawy, CC BY-SA 2.0.