CAIRO - Would you like to be part of 16th Century history and admire the magnificent collection of oriental furniture, rugs, glassware, silk, Strass crystal and embroidered Arab costumes? See stylish furniture and works of art from Turkey, Persia, Syria and other iconic places of the Orient? If yes, please visit the Gayer-Anderson Museum or Beit al-Kritliyya, located in Ibn Tulun St., next to the Mosque of Ibn Tulun in the Sayeda Zeinab district. The Gayer-Anderson Museum has been so named in acknowledgement and remembrance of an early 20th Century British officer who put up in the place between 1953 and 1942 with permission from the Egyptian government. The museum consists of two houses. The larger one was constructed in 1632 by Hajj Mohamed ibn al-Hajj Salem ibn Galman al-Gazzar. It later came into the possession of a wealthy Muslim woman from Crete, and the home became popularly known as Beit al-Kritliyya, or 'House of the Cretan Woman'. The second house was built by some Abdel-Qader al-Haddad in 1540. It later became known as 'Beit Amna bint Salim', after its last owner. The two houses were joined by a bridge at the third floor level and are together known as Bayt al-Kritliyya. The property was turned into a museum in 1937, when the government decided to transform it into a well-preserved model of early Ottoman residential architecture. Upon entering the museum, you will admire the fine-looking and well-preserved gardens. The first part of the museum boasts huge brown-coloured water containers called sabeel (meaning water resource in Arabic), which were used in the past by passersby to drink water. A small corridor leads you to an interior courtyard, where you can admire the old walls with wonderful Islamic decorations and the balconies above. Getting acquainted with the museum's interior starts with the salamlek, a place only for men. It contains a huge sofa and mashrabia (a type of projecting oriel window enclosed with engraved wood latticework) windows. The amazing wooden ceiling is gold-plated with Qur'anic verses. There is also a summer salamlek with two sofas facing each other, a decorated balcony overlooking the courtyard mentioned before. There are also some small ornate wooden chairs. You can easily imagine Gayer Anderson sitting there, drinking tea and chatting with his Egyptian friends. There is also a haramlek, a women-only hall, reachable through a passage from the salamlek. It is a spacious area full of furniture and mashrabiya windows, which enabled the women to watch from the windows without being seen. These mashrabiya screens were composed of narrow pieces of Arabesques and very small openings. The room itself has many sofas, tables and chairs. As this is the women's hall, you wonít be surprised to see a large collection of jewellery boxes. Another wonderful place is the roof terrace. Upon entering, you will see mashrabiya screens with the Arabic words La Elah Ella Allah, Mohamed Rasoul Allah (There is no God but Allah... Mohamed is His Prophet). From this roof you have a nice view of the magnificent Ibn Toloun Mosque which was constructed in 884, the largest mosque in Cairo. The terrace walls display decorations such as a Mazwalah or sundial made of tiles. It was used in the past to show the prayer times. There is also an old set of water taps. Next to the walls there are big containers to keep food, oil and other supplies. From the roof you can cross the bridge built between the two houses and walk over to Abdel-Qader al-Haddad House. The first room you enter is Gayer-Andersonís bedroom. His big four-poster jumbo bed boasts a canopy designed in Persian style by Gayer-Anderson himself. Next to it you see his servantís bed. The room contains a statue of Queen Nefertiti and one of a cat goddess, and on the right of the door is a black mummy case. Next is a guestroom with lavish furniture. There are glass cupboards that contain items from the Ottoman period collected by Gayer-Anderson. The room is lit by a huge candle lantern next to a beautiful portrait of Mohamed Ali Pasha. Then comes another haramlek with a wooden cupboard for jewellery. Everything looks normal at first, but when the guide moves the cupboard a secret doorway appears. The door leads to a very narrow passage with mashrabiya windows on the right and wooden chairs on the left. It was used by the women of the house to watch what was going on in the banquet hall without being seen. So many wonderful treasures are on display in the house, which has also become famous as a movie filming location, for example in the James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me. The museum is open daily from 9am to 4pm.
