The Egyptian Hall was built by William Bullock as a museum to house his collection, which included curiosities brought back from the South Seas by Captain Cook. By the 1860s the hall was used primarily for popular entertainment, including novelty, variety and freak acts, a more sophisticated, English version of the American dime museum.

By the end of the nineteenth century, the hall showed primarily magic and spiritualism acts. In 1873 William Morton took on the management of the hall and modified it for his protegees, Malians and illusionists Maskelyne and Cooke who occupied the hall for 31 years. The final performance was on January 5. 1905.