Eight pages of text by Sir William Garstin, the Under Secretary of State for Public Works in Egypt. 31 large mounted silver mat collodion photographs, each signed in the negative by the photographer "D. S. George". (Oblong folio) 33x38.1 cm (13x15"), brown leather backed boards with the title and a star and crescent in gilt on front panel, top edge gilt.

An impressive series of photographs recording the human effort of this massive engineering feat. These images are dramatically teaming with hundreds of workers moving and stacking rocks and masonry by hand. The opening pages of text describe the construction and politics surrounding the building of the first Aswan dam. The photographs illustrate an overview of the channel at the commencement of work, the temporary closing of the channel, \the excavation, laying of masonry, and the completed dam, sluices and locks.

Also depicted is the Island of Philae, a historic site of temples threatened with destruction by the high waters behind the dam. The engineers attempted to re-enforce the foundations of these ancient monuments; one photograph shows the underpinnings needed to protect a temple colonnade. Eight photographs depict the construction of the Asyut Barrage, a diversion dam. The need to control the flood waters of the Nile was well established by the late nineteenth century. Between 1898 and 1902 the British and Egyptian governments undertook the construction of the massive dam at Aswan. Sir William Willcocks designed this great project, collaborating with some of the foremost British engineers of the day. Aswan was a gravity dam, one and one quarter miles across and 177 feet (54 meters) at its highest point. Soon to be found inadequate, the height of the dam was raised twice before 1933.