Cairo (Arabic: القاهرة
transliteration: Al-Qāhirah), which means "The Vanquisher" or "The
Triumphant", is the capital city of Egypt. While Al-Qahirah is the
official name of the city, in Egyptian Arabic it commonly shares the
dialect's name for the country, transliteration: Masr. It has a
metropolitan area population of about 15.75 million people.[1] Cairo
is the sixteenth most populous metropolitan area in the world. It is
also the most populous metropolitan area in Africa .
The city was founded in AD 969 as the royal enclosure for the
Fatimid caliphs, while the actual economic and administrative
capital was in nearby Fustat. After Fustat was destroyed in
1168/1169 to prevent its capture by the Crusaders, the
administrative capital of Egypt moved to Cairo, where it has
remained ever since.
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