The story
This is the fourth photograph of the Kaaba in the Matson Collection at the Library of Congress. Its title in the record is “Mecca, ca. 1910. [The Kaaba]”; the brackets mean the title was given by the cataloguers, not the photographer.
We show it with its companions because the different angles help in understanding the place.
Look again: Compare the angle of this photograph with the angles of the three other photographs in the collection.
What do we know? What don’t we know?
What we know:
- The glass negative is held by the Library of Congress in the Matson Collection, and the record dates it to about 1910.
- The record’s rights statement reads: “No known restrictions on publication.”
What we do not know, or cannot be sure of:
- Who took the original photograph: the catalogue describes the negative as a “copy neg.”, so it may be copied from an older photograph.
- The exact date: “ca. 1910” is the archive’s estimate.
- “No known restrictions” is not an explicit licence, so the item awaits a rights review before wider public use.