Orientalist images represent more than two-thirds of Gérôme's painted oeuvre and are based on his travels in the Near East, especially North Africa. Paul-Marie Lenoir, Gérôme's student and one of his traveling companions, recorded a description of their 1868 visit to the Egyptian mosque of 'Amr in Cairo, founded in A.D. 640, whose interior Gérôme depicted in this painting. The rows of worshipers, ranging from the dignitary and his attendants to the loincloth-clad Muslim holy man, face Mecca during one of the five daily prayers. It is unlikely, however, that Gérôme witnessed such a scene at this particular mosque, which, by 1868, had fallen into disuse. Rather, the image is probably a composite of sketches as well as photographs of various sites.

Inscription: Signed (upper right, on beam): J.L. GEROME

[Goupil & Cie, Paris, 1874; stock no. 9275, purchased on September 23 for Fr 20,000; sold on November 5, for Fr 40,000, to Knoedler]; [M. Knoedler, New York, 1874; sold on November 13, for $10,670, to Wolfe]; Catharine Lorillard Wolfe, New York (1874–d. 1887; her bequest to MMA)

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Taste of the Seventies," April 2–September 10, 1946, no. 109 (as "Figures in a Mosque").

London. Royal Academy of Arts. "The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse: European Painters in North Africa and the Near East," March 24–May 27, 1984, no. 32 (as "Prayer in the Mosque of 'Amr").

Washington. National Gallery of Art. "The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse: The Allure of North Africa and the Near East," July 1–October 28, 1984, no. 34.

St. Petersburg, Fla. Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, Fla.. "The Lure of Egypt: Land of the Pharoahs Revisited," January 10–June 9, 1996, no. 19 (as "Prayer in the Mosque").

Bordeaux. Musée Goupil. "Gérôme & Goupil: Art et Entreprise," October 12, 2000–January 14, 2001, no. 72 (as "La Prière publique dans une mosquée").

New York. Dahesh Museum of Art. "Gérôme & Goupil: Art and Enterprise," February 6–May 5, 2001, no. 72 (as " Prayer in the Mosque of Amr, Cairo [La prière publique dans une mosquée]").

Pittsburgh. Frick Art & Historical Center. "Gérôme & Goupil: Art and Enterprise," June 7–August 12, 2001, no. 72.

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. "The Masterpieces of French Painting from The Metropolitan Museum of Art: 1800–1920," February 4–May 6, 2007, no. 38.

Berlin. Neue Nationalgalerie. "Französische Meisterwerke des 19.Jahrhunderts aus dem Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York," June 1–October 7, 2007, unnumbered cat.

Los Angeles. J. Paul Getty Museum. "The Spectacular Art of Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904)," June 15–September 12, 2010, no. 146 (as "Public Prayer in the Mosque of Amr").

Paris. Musée d'Orsay. "Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904). L'Histoire en spectacle," October 19, 2010–January 23, 2011, no. 146.

Madrid. Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza. "Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904)," February 15–May 22, 2011, no. 22.

The Art Treasures of America. reprint, 1977. New York, 1879, vol. 1, pp. 126–27, 134.

Cicerone. "Private Galleries: Collection of Miss Catharine L. Wolfe." Art Amateur 2 (March 1880), p. 76.

Gérôme: A Collection of the Works of Gérôme in One Hundred Photogravures. New York, 1881, vol. 2, unpaginated, ill.

"Gallery and Studio: The Metropolitan Museum of Art." Art Amateur 18 (December 1887), p. 7.

"The Fine Arts: Recent Gifts to the Metropolitan Museum." Critic (April 16, 1887), p. 194.

Montezuma [Montague Marks]. "My Note Book." Art Amateur 16 (May 1887), p. 122.

M[ariana]. G[riswold]. van Rensselaer. "Pictures of the Season in New York. III." American Architect and Building News 21 (April 23, 1887), p. 195.

C. H. Stranahan. A History of French Painting from its Earliest to its Latest Practice. New York, 1888, p. 319.

Walter Rowlands. "The Miss Wolfe Collection." Art Journal, n.s., (January 1889), p. 14.

Cyclopedia of Painters and Paintings. New York, 1892, vol. 2, p. 129.

Fanny Field Hering. Gérôme: The Life and Works of Jean Léon Gérôme. New York, 1892, p. 126.

"The Metropolitan Museum of Art—The French Painters." New York Times (May 22, 1895), p. 4.

Gustave Haller. Nos grands peintres: Catalogue de leurs œuvres et opinions de la presse. Paris, 1899, p. 101.

Arthur Hoeber. The Treasures of The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York. New York, 1899, pp. 80–81.

Frank Fowler. "The Field of Art: Modern Foreign Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum, Some Examples of the French School." Scribner's Magazine 44 (September 1908), pp. 381–83, ill.

R. H. Ives Gammell. Twilight of Painting: An Analysis of Recent Trends to Serve in a Period of Reconstruction. New York, 1946, unpaginated, pl. 23.

Charles Sterling, and Margaretta M. Salinger. "XIX Century." French Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 2, New York, 1966, p. 171, ill.

Gerald M. Ackerman. "Gérôme's 'A Chat by the Fireside'." The Register of the Museum of Art 4 (March 1971), pp. 21, 25–26, ill.

Richard Ettinghausen in Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1824–1904. Exh. cat., Dayton Art Institute. 1972, pp. 22–23, fig. 12.

John Rewald. "Should Hoving Be De-accessioned?" Art in America 61 (January–February 1973), p. 28.

Donald A. Rosenthal. Orientalism: The Near East in French Painting 1800–1880. Exh. cat., Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester. Rochester, N.Y., 1982, p. 78.

Albert Boime. "Gérôme and the Bourgeois Artist's Burden." Arts magazine 57 (January 1983), p. 73.

Mary Anne Stevens in The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse, the Allure of North Africa and the Near East. Exh. cat., Royal Academy of Arts, London. New York, 1984, pp. 65, 144, no. 34, ill. (color and black and white) [British ed., "The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse, European Painters in North Africa and the Near East," London, 1984, pp. 65, 142, no. 32, ill. (color and black and white)].

Malcolm Warner in The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse, the Allure of North Africa and the Near East. Exh. cat., Royal Academy of Arts, London. New York, 1984, pp. 35–36, fig. 13 [British edition, "The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse, European Painters in North Africa and the Near East," London, 1984, same pagination].

Gerald M. Ackerman. The Life and Work of Jean-Léon Gérôme, with a catalogue raisonné. London, 1986, pp. 93, 228, no. 200, ill. (color and black and white).

Gerald M. Ackerman. "Gérôme's Oriental Paintings and the Western Genre Tradition." Arts Magazine 60 (March 1986), pp. 76–77, fig. 7.

François Pouillon. "L'Ombre de l'islam: Les figurations de la pratique religieuse dans la peinture orientaliste du 19e siècle." Actes de la recherche en sciences sociales no. 75 (November 1988), p. 30, fig. 9.

Christine Peltre. L'atelier du voyage: Les peintres en Orient au XIXe siècle. Paris, 1995, p. 61.

Jennifer Hardin. The Lure of Egypt: Land of the Pharaohs Revisited. Exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, Fla. St. Petersburg, Fla., [1996], pp. 8, 22, no. 19, ill. (color).

Caroline Williams. "Jean-Léon Gérome: A Case Study of an Orientalist Painter." Fantasy or Ethnography? Irony and Collusion in Subaltern Representation. Columbus, 1996, p. 137.

Rebecca A. Rabinow. "Catharine Lorillard Wolfe: The First Woman Benefactor of the Metropolitan Museum." Apollo 147 (March 1998), p. 54 n. 18.

Gerald M. Ackerman. Jean-Léon Gérôme: Monographie révisée, catalogue raisonné mis à jour. 2nd rev. ed. (1st ed., 1986). Paris, 2000, p. 105, 274, no. 200, ill. (color).

Stephen R. Edidin in Gérôme & Goupil: Art and Enterprise. Exh. cat., Musée Goupil, Bordeaux. Paris, 2000, pp. 120–21, 161, no. 72, ill. (color and photogravure).

Petra ten-Doesschate Chu. Nineteenth-Century European Art. 2nd ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J., 2006, p. 281, fig. 12-14 (color).

Kathryn Calley Galitz in Masterpieces of European Painting, 1800–1920, in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2007, pp. 70, 253–54, no. 64, ill. (color and black and white).

Kathryn Calley Galitz in The Masterpieces of French Painting from The Metropolitan Museum of Art: 1800–1920. Exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. New York, 2007, pp. 60–61, 216–17, no. 38, ill. (overall and detail, color and black and white).

19th Century European Art, Including the Orientalist Sale. Sotheby's, New York. April 18, 2008, pp. 332, 335, under no. 193, fig. 2 (color).

Scott C. Allan in The Spectacular Art of Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904). Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Paris, 2010, pp. 246–47, no. 146, ill. (color).

Sophie Makariou and Charlotte Maury in The Spectacular Art of Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904). Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Paris, 2010, pp. 260, 262.

Philippe Mariot in The Spectacular Art of Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904). Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Paris, 2010, p. 345.

Mary G. Morton in The Spectacular Art of Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904). Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles. Paris, 2010, p. 280.