The Orient was almost a European invention, and had been since antiquity a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories and landscapes, remarkable experiences o the main thing for the European visitor was a European representation of the Orient and its contemporary fate5  The Orient was almost a European invention, and had been since antiquity a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories and landscapes, remarkable experiences.  the main thing for the European visitor was a European representation of the Orient and its contemporary fate