The site of El-Fustât, or Old Cairo, lies about a mile and a half from the modern city, on the plain between the Nile and the Mokattam hills.
With the exception of the Coptic churches and monasteries little of it now remains, and its site is covered by great heaps of rubbish full of fragments of pottery of various dates.
The Coptic churches are grouped together in “dayrs,” or inclosures surrounded by high walls, into which there is only one small entrance; these walls were to protect the Copts from the attacks of the Moslem population.