Record of prince in Holy Land to go on show

Queen Victoria’s eldest son, the future King Edward VII, travelled on an educational trip to the Middle East in 1862 when he was the Prince of Wales.

He was joined by Francis Bedford, the first photographer to accompany a royal tour. Bedford’s images of the trip captured a view of Bethlehem from the roof of the Church of the Nativity, said to be on the spot where Jesus was born.

He also took a picture of the Shepherds’ Field showing the area where the Angel Gabriel is said to have appeared to the shepherds.

The photographs, which belong to the Royal Collection, will form part of a new exhibition, Cairo to Constantinople: Early Photographs of the Middle East at The Queen’s Gallery, Palace of Holyroodhouse, from March 8.

Curator Sophie Gordon said the purpose of taking the photograph from the Church of the Nativity was to add weight to the Christian tradition.

Dr Gordon added: “Very little was known about this part of the world at the time, and what information they did have was largely based on knowledge of the Bible.”

Photography had only been introduced to the public in 1839. “Bedford’s camera would have been quite large to accommodate a 10 x 12in glass plate negative,” Dr Gordon added. “He must have had porters to carry all his equipment, as the entire photographic process had to be done on the spot.”

The then Prince of Wales recorded in his diary entry for April 3, 1862 how “our tents were struck at 8.30am and we started at that time (on horseback of course) for Bethlehem, which we reached in about a couple of hours time, stopping on the way at Rachel’s tomb, and it was ascertained for certain that the tomb is on the site of the real one”.