Egypt, Nubia, and Ethiopia. Illustrated by One Hundred Stereoscopic Photographs is a beautifully designed book about the monuments of Ancient Egypt. The book was published in 1862 by Smith, Elder and Co. from London. The texts are written by Samuel Sharpe (1799–1881), who wrote several books on Egyptian history. The texts are illustrated with wood engravings by Joseph Bonomi (1796–1878), an English sculptor, artist and Egyptologist. The book has 238 numbered pages and the red cover and spine are richly decorated with flower and ibis ornaments. However, most striking are the 100 tipped-in stereoviews of Francis Frith.
Books with stereoviews flourished in the second half of the 19th century. The first book that included stereoviews was Tenerife, An Astronomers Experiment by C. Piazzi Smyth, which was published in 1858. The book contained 20 stereoviews1.
Stereoviews that were mounted in a book could be viewed with specially designed stereoscopes. The most well-known is the high-quality Mirror Stereoscope of Smith, Beck & Beck (later R & J Beck).
The stereoviews of Egypt, Nubia, and Ethiopia were made during Frith’s third journey to Egypt. Stereoviews from his first two journeys had already been published as glass and paper card stereoviews by publisher Negretti & Zambra.
In the summer of 1859, Frith set out on his third and final journey to Egypt. This journey would become his most ambitious one. He explored new locations and rephotographed monuments that he had visited before. He reached the Third Cataract and travelled farther south than any photographer had ever done before. An 18-day trek through the desert by camel brought him to the Temple of Soleb, his southermost objective and whose location was at that time considered Ethiopia (present day Sudan). Frith was now 1.300 km from Cairo.
The stereoviews in the book are arranged geographically and follow Frith’s journey from Cairo to Soleb. The albumen prints have a size of approximately 7 x 14 cm. Each print is pasted onto a separate page, which made producing the book labour-intensive. The images are provided with a title in capital letters and a unique Roman numeral. Some images have an italicised subtitle. During his earlier journeys, Frith scratched his name and a number into the negative. The stereoviews in the book show only his name.
The name Frith is visible in the lower left corner
Glossary: negative
Francis Frith
Francis Frith (1822–1898) was an English photographer and publisher. He became famous for his three trips to Egypt and the Holy Land in 1856–1857, 1857–1858 and 1859–1860. He photographed the ancient monuments and biblical places with three cameras (including a stereo camera), and the collodion wet plate process. The photos of his trips were published as stereoviews and in print editions. The commercial success of his published photos inspired Frith to set up his own photographic publishing company, F. Frith & Co. The company became the first publisher in England to produce and distribute images on a large scale.
The complete story of Francis Frith
References
- D. Starkman (2020) An Abbreviated History of Stereo-Pair Illustrated books. Via: stereosite.com ↩︎