Name of Object:

The artificial channel built at Shellal, during the construction of the first dam on the Nile

Name in original language:

Canale artificiale del Nilo a Scellal

Location:

Rome, Italy

Holding Institution:

Italian Geographical Society (SGI)

 About Italian Geographical Society (SGI), Rome

Holding Institution (original language):

Società Geografica Italiana (SGI)

Date of Object:

1900

Author:

Giulio d’Aspremont

Description:

In the year 1900, Count Giulio d’Aspremont, an Italian diplomat, visited the construction site of the first dam across the Nile (today known as the Aswan Low Dam or Old Aswan Dam). He took several photographs of the works and of the monuments on the island of Philae that were slated to be submerged by the water. He published some of them on the Bulletin of the Italian Geographical Society, where he wrote that up to 2,000 Italian workers were employed in the works (as stone-cutters, miners and masons), out of a total labour force of about 10,000 or 12,000; an Italian village had sprung up on the Nile banks, with modest little houses, trattorias and shops.

Archival or Bibliographical Reference:

Archivio fotografico, 9_3_1

Citation of this web page:

Patrizia Pampana "The artificial channel built at Shellal, during the construction of the first dam on the Nile" in "Sharing History", Museum With No Frontiers, 2025.
https://sharinghistory.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;AWE;it;51;en

Prepared by: Patrizia Pampana
Copyedited by: Anne Dowell

MWNF Working Number: IT1 051