Ellen worked, and later lived, in a harem. So maybe at this point it would be as well to look at what a harem was, particularly as there are still misconceptions about them. For as Leslie Peirce wrote in her book The imperial harem: women and sovereignty in the Ottoman Empire (Oxford University Press, 1993): “The harem is undoubtedly the most prevalent symbol in Western myths constructed around the theme of Muslim sensuality... Europe elaborated a myth of oriental tyranny and located its essence in the sultan’s harem. Orgiastic sex became a metaphor for power corrupted.”
Such pictures as these were usually painted by artists who had never – indeed could never – actually set foot in a harem. They knew that an all-powerful ruler lived in a palace with literally hundreds of women, and their imaginations overheated. In fact, a harem could be a deadly dull place, with very few of its occupants having sexual relationships with anyone. As Leslie Peirce (op. cit.) explains: “It was not sex, however, that was the fundamental dynamic of the harem, but rather family politics. This is not to say that sex... was absent as an animating force within the imperial harem, but it was only one of several forces, and... one of relatively little importance.”However, the average reader of 1893, the year Ellen’s book was published, would not have been aware of this. As Ellen, who was certainly nobody’s fool, realised only too well. She also must have realised that her book would inevitably be compared with Emmeline Lott’s series of books, which were still popular.
Indeed, she was plainly careful about the title given to her book: Recollections of an Egyptian princess by her English governess: being a record of five years’ residence at the Court of Ismael Pasha, Khédive. Nowhere, you will note, does the dreaded word “harem” appear. She was also careful – or perhaps fortunate – in her publishers, William Blackwood and Sons of Edinburgh and London, who had a reputation as a publisher of high-quality, ‘serious’ works
All these contrast enormously with Emmeline Lott’s books. On an 1867 fourth edition, which I have, the title HAREM LIFE IN EGYPT AND TURKEY appears on the spine in large capitals, plainly to attract a certain sort of reader. On the front board, the words The English governess in Egypt and Turkey are printed. There is nothing to dissuade a reader in search of sexual titillation; governesses were a popular theme in Victorian pornography.
Lott was to get even worse; the book she wrote next, supposedly about her “experiences”, was labelled on the spine as NIGHTS IN THE HAREM. On the front cover of this comes the rather obscure subtitle The mohaddetyn in the Palace of Ghezire. Nights in the harem is even more imaginative than Harem life in Egypt and Turkey, intended by Lott to show how “the Grand Pacha... [and the various princes] are accustomed to pass their evenings in the Viceregal Odalisk [sic].” The traditional Ottoman system resembled a pyramid. At the top was the ruler; the Sultan in Turkey, the Khedive (or equivalent) in Egypt. Beneath him – indeed, not always beneath him - was his mother, the Validé Sultan (Validé Pasha, in Egypt). She had, traditionally, been above even the Vizier, and during the “Sultanate of Women” during the 16th – 17th centuries, a succession of
Validé Sultans had been the effective rulers. It was she who ran the harem, and had absolute precedence there. Emmeline Lott described how “the young princesses waited like a band of slaves until their imperious grandmother [i.e. the Validé Pasha] had finished her toilette, as she never would receive them in her chamber.” (For no doubt practical reasons, although Lott, being Lott, decided that she had a sinister motive for it). Indeed, the formidable Pertevniyal Validé Sultan, was believed to have once slapped Empress Eugénie of France across the face for daring to set foot in her harem in Constantinople, nearly causing a serious international incident.Ismail’s mother was Hoshiar (or Hoshyar) Validé Pasha (? – 1886), who was in fact Pertevniyal Validé Sultan’s sister, which helped diplomatic relationships between Egypt and the rest of the Ottoman Empire. In the 1860s, as Lott described, Hoshiar was still living with the rest of the Khedival family.
However, by the 1870s she had moved to her own home, the Qasr al-Ali Palace. This was described by Hassan Hassan, in his book In the house of Muhammad Ali: A family album 1805-1952 (American University in Cairo Press, 2000) as “a most charming house on the road to Helwan [a district of Cairo], which was artificially elevated so one could see the Nile and pyramids of Saqqara on the other shore.” Hassan describes how the Validé Pasha had two all-female orchestras, “one for European and the other for oriental music.” The musicians were dressed, it seemed, in semi-military uniforms.
Emmeline Lott, of course, disliked Hoshiar as much as she disliked everyone else, describing her in her book The English governess in Egypt as “imperious”. “She even”, Lott shrieked, “went so far as to expect that I should kneel at her feet and squat down at her door like a slave.”
It is impossible to know the truth of this, although Hoshiar treated Ellen and Mrs. Freeland very hospitably. Indeed, many of Lott’s other criticisms of Hoshiar are hard to believe: “There was a lack of... amiability and suavity of manner about her” (this is contradicted by Ellen’s description of her). “There is no doubt that she meddled indirectly in the weightiest affairs of the state” (pure assumption; Lott gives no actual evidence of it). “She was extremely penurious – nay, mean would be the more appropriate expression” (an accusation which contrasts with the fact of her keeping two orchestras, and even with Lott’s own description of her giving packets of gold coins to her grandson).
Still, it is possible that at least the accusation of her “imperiousness” was not entirely without foundation. Hassan Hassan, op. cit., described how she “held quite incredible state, never condescending to leave her home for anyone else’s, however high ranking that person may have been.” Without doubt the sister of Pertevniyal!
At least Emmeline Lott leaves us with a physical description of her. “She was a short elderly person... with grey hair and large piercing black eyes.” Lott guessed correctly that she had been “brought up in the Imperial court of Is-tam-bol”, and that she had lived in the “old palace of Bebek” (not to be mistaken with the present palace at Bebek) there.
Ellen had been invited to Qasr el-Ali in 1871, during the celebration of Bairam, the period following Ramadan. And her description of Hoshiar contrasts absolutely with Lott’s. “The Queen Mother... received us [i.e. Ellen and Mrs. Freeland, who went with her] with a mixture of dignity and courtesy that struck us much. She looked very pleasantly at us, asked us a few questions...”
Hoshiar naturally preferred the oriental style that she had been brought up amongst. Ellen described the Qasr el-Ali Palace as being “handsomer and at the same time more oriental than Abdeen... there was an ineffable something which looked more eastern [than at Abdeen].” Hoshiar herself preferred traditional dress:
“She was not dressed in European costume; but it being a cold day, she had a beautiful Persian shawl wound about her body.” By 1873, unfortunately she seems to have fallen into poor health; Ellen saying that she “had been an invalid for some time past.”Below the Validé Sultan or Pasha were the Hasseki Sultans, women who were any of the four wives allowed to a man (and still allowed) under Islam, who had borne sons. Zeynab’s mother, Jananyar, the Second Princess, was one of these.
Beneath these, were the Hasseki Kadin, wives who had borne only daughters. These women (plural hassoladik) were free; having the Sultan’s (or Khedive’s) child freed you. Those beneath them were slaves (although it might be more accurate to think of them as indentured servants, as they were paid, sometimes very well), and were still so in Ellen’s time.
The idea of having four wives (and various other women who could rise to that rank) was actually rather practical for a ruler, as it virtually ensured an heir. Indeed, it might be argued that it was a better system than the monogamous western one; recall for instance Henry VIII chopping off his wives’ heads, or divorcing them, one after another, in order to try to find one who would bear him a son. In fact Henry had sons with his mistresses, and under the Ottoman system they would have become the heir to the throne.
Women who slept with the Sultan (or Khedive) but who had not given birth were called an “ikbal”, loosely translated as “fortunate girl”. And indeed they could be fortunate, for the way was, potentially, open to them to become the next Validé Sultan. Beneath them were “gödze”, literally “women who the Sultan had his eye on”. They had not yet slept with him, however. (Presumably the rank was intended to be only temporary). However, a woman only got to be a gödze if the Validé Princess allowed it, and this was one of the sources of her power. (A new gödze was traditionally introduced to Mr. Big by serving him coffee). Other women, however, were not allowed to even see him (a harem therefore being far from the place of almost unlimited female availability for the ruler, of popular imagination).
Being an ikbal or a gödze was actually a paid job; they were considered in salary terms to be middle-ranking women, receiving a stipend about half that of the most important slaves such as housekeeper (see below), but five times more than an ordinary slave.
Beneath the gödze were the up and coming young women of the harem; the most talented and beautiful. Kopsès is an example of one such. Most of them either married top officials, or were kept as a high-ranking servant to a hassoladik, or even the Validé Sultan herself. The latter was plainly what was intended for Kopsès, who had since childhood been brought up as Princess Zeynab’s right-hand woman. After Zeynab’s death, she went to live with the Second Princess.
(A childless wife, in fact, could even adopt such a girl as a daughter, as was the case with the Third Princess, who adopted a young woman called Faïk Hanem).
Kopsès, in fact, had a valuable role in the harem; for example during the preparations for Princess Zeynab’s wedding, “The valuable services which Kopsès could render, made her much in request... Kopsès understood four languages, Turkish, Arabic, French, and English... So Kopsès was constantly
being called away to act as interpreter.”
Whether Kopsès would ever have been married to some important official will never be known, as sadly she died early, perhaps some time in the late 1880s. But women such as her were greatly valued as wives, due to their education, close links with the Court, and of course in Kopsès case, her great beauty. In earlier times she might well have become a gödze, and would then have without much doubt become an ikbal. That would have opened her way to, eventually, becoming the next Validé.
Women such as Kopsès were traditionally selected from amongst the “cariye”, (novices, or pupils). A traditional harem included what was in effect a sizeable
girl’s school. Lessons were given in Turkish, Arabic (or Persian, depending on which part of the Ottoman Empire the harem was in), Islamic religion (although Moslems could not be made into slaves, women could convert to Islam later on,
and often did), dancing, poetry, music, singing, reading and writing.Lessons were also supposedly given in love-making, although what this actually meant in practice is questionable, as it was important that each girl remained a virgin until either married, or caught the ruler’s eye. It would appear, however, that they were at least told about “the birds and the bees”.
To balance this, lessons were also given in morality, good behaviour, and “respectability.” In all, it was probably a far better education (and start to married life) than a woman of the time could expect in the west for many centuries.
Young women who had the right sort of talent were “educated as musicians, dancers, and sometimes as comedians or pantomimists;” as Ellen put it, “but it is purely for the amusement of the mistress and her guests.” Most large harems had a band of female musicians, in fact, although the Validé Pasha’s two bands was almost unique.
This unique photo shows the Third Princess's band, performing for her in the harem. They have many of the same traditional instruments as the women in the picture above, (as well as modern ones, such as the violin) but seem rather more decorous.
The best of the cariyes - those who graduated, as it were - were known as “gediks” (“the privileged”). A gedik might be allowed to see the Sultan (and he her), and might even be allowed to speak to him. She might then go on to become a gödze, although the vast majority of girls entering a harem could expect to become either upper servants, or married to some official.
A good analogy of what it was all like is given by Godfrey Goodwin, in his book The private world of Ottoman Women (Saqui Books, 1997): “Living in the Harem must at times have seemed like living in the waiting-room of a provincial station. Just enough people came and went to make relationships lopsided. It was not that one had lost one’s ticket but that one wondered if one would ever need one.”
The majority of those living in a harem were slaves, either eunuchs, or various ranks of women servants. Some of the female servants, those who as it were formed part of the royal household, held important and highly-paid posts, such as Teacher; “Treasurer” (who looked after the valuables, and also acted as a kind of mistress of ceremonies at important occasions, and who carried a staff of office to mark her status); “Calfa” (overseer); “Cahir” (housekeeper), Mistres of the Palace, Mistress of the Laundry, Coffee Mistress, Scribal Mistress, Mistress of the Pantry, Hairdresser, and “Dada” (nurse).
And as Ellen explained, “The Dada of a princess is always a person of great importance in the harem, and in... [Princess Zeynab’s] case particularly so, as, on account of the extreme youth of the Princess, the general superintendence of the household devolved upon her”. Zeynab’s “Dada” seems to have been a lively, fun-loving woman, fond of practical jokes, although not well-educated.
These important women often had assistants, sometimes described as Stewardesses, such as the Second Scribe, Assistant Pantry Mistress, and the chief “jariye” (see below), and the attendants of princesses living outside the palace. These were at about the same rank as the ikbals, and paid about the same.
The more important servants, although slaves themselves, also had slaves under them. One was even appointed to serve Ellen, but: “as an Englishwoman I could not have a slave, and... the girl evidently looked upon it as a degradation to wait upon a Giaour, [foreigner] and took so little pains to understand my requirements... I found it far less irritating to do everything for myself.”
Ellen summarised the organisational structure of the harems of the 1870s:
“Those [slaves] immediately about the person of the Princess were of higher rank; they aspired to be ultimately the wives of beys or pashas, and theri white hands were never soiled by any menial work. But there were from ten to a dozen sofradjis, who waited at table; others whose business it was to carry drinking-water to the different apartments, and who kept the keys of the rooms containing the filtering machines; others, again, who held the office of upper housemaids, &c. These made up a goodly number, and when their regular work was done they lounged about in the central saloon awaiting the return of their mistress... if any new white slaves were purchased they would probably fall into this class, so they met on terms of equality.” Plainly not much had changed – so far – for centuries.
Harem eunuch 
The majority of women in an imperial harem were known as “jariyes”, which simply means “female slave.” (Male slaves were known as “kul”). They were paid only about one tenth of the stipend given to the chief ranking servants. They were assigned work in different parts of the harem, such as the pantry, boiler-room, etc., and received the lowest stipends of all. Whether they worked very hard is open to question.
They could be, and indeed were, beaten on occasions; once Ellen’s coachman was bastinadoed (beaten on the soles of the feet) for bad behaviour, and in Zeynab’s own household, when that became established, Ellen recorded that “Two negresses were flogged, one at a time [by the eunuchs]... the chastisement was administered because these two negresses had not hurried out of the way at the cry of ‘Dustoor!’ raised by the eunuchs who precede the men carrying in the heavy trays for the harem meals. The cry is heard from a distance, so there is always plenty of time to get out of the way. The negresses were therefore clearly guilty of contumacy, and liable to punishment.”
Ellen also described how a Calfa would stand watching a group of jariyes at work, with “a long switch in her hand” that she did in fact use “to reach any idler, and give due admonishment.” (This must be set against the fact that free labourers outside the palaces, such as farm-labourers, could also on occasion be beaten at this time).
On the other hand, it was a secure income for life. As Ellen wrote: “Each received a monthly stipend, more or less, according to her position. This would be continued to be paid up to the end of her life.” This was at a time when there were no old-age pensions in Western countries; indeed, someone like Ellen, approaching old age, must have seen the advantages of this.
They also got rewards other than their pay. Ellen describes how, in Bairam, the festival following Ramadan, each of the slaves was given clothes. “The slaves were called in one by one, and received what was allotted to them. This was for each person three dresses, one being perhaps the richest silk or satin, and the other two fine woollen. In addition to this, the upper slaves also had a velvet jacket, or something of the sort.” And what was more, they got “other occasional windfalls in the course of the year. If she married, there was her dower and trousseau.”
In fact Ellen’s greatest complaint against slavery in the harem was its financial cost! “Each one of these persons”, she wrote, “had cost a good deal in purchase money.” Indeed, she recorded the price of a musician as being about £250 (approximately £17,150 in current prices according to the Retail Price Index, or around £142,390 in current average earnings), and that a “very beautiful slave would cost several thousand pounds”, although that was exceptional; Ellen says that “I never saw one of these overpowering beauties.”
A “Circassian slave child of about three years old” that Zeynab actually seems to have bought as a kind of pet, to replace a pet dog, cost £125 (£8,575 at the current Retail Price Index; £71,200 in current average earnings). Not surprisingly, therefore, Ellen asked “Will not everyone agree with me that slavery is a very costly institution, and that the country would gain much, financially as well as morally, by the emancipation of women, [i.e. in this sense freeing from slavery] and the gradual introduction into households of hired female labour?”
Given the attitudes of the time, unfortunately “there was however a marked difference made between the white and black slaves. To the latter all the menial work was allotted, and I observed that although many of the white girls acted as housemaids, &c., they would always, if no calfa was present, try to shift their work upon any unlucky black girl who came in their way.” On the other hand, this prejudice was double-edged, as the white girls were forced to clean the private rooms of the palace, “as the furniture was too costly to be entrusted to the blacks”. Furthermore, “wherever the calfa was present, the whites could not shirk their duty.”
Ellen herself was to go to live in the harem with Princess Zeynab, after Zeynab’s marriage. Ellen certainly had her doubts about doing so. “I felt exceedingly my approaching ‘shutting up,’ as it seemed to involve separation from everything which had interested me during the whole of my past life. Nothing but the great affection I felt for my pupil, and my hope of being able to influence for good her future life, could have influenced me to submit to a residence in the harem.”
Indeed, once there she found that she often had very little to do; Zeynab became (not surprisingly) less interested in lessons, effectively leaving Ellen without work, apart from giving a very basic education to some of the younger slaves. And not only that, but “I passed whole days in the house, with no one to talk to, no books or papers to read, and nothing but my piano for recreation.”
Ennui in the harem Unsurprisin
gly, Ellen “began to doubt whether I was right to sacrifice the few remaining years of health and strength which might be in store for me in this dreadful monotony of harem life.” (Indeed, Princess Zeynab also suffered from her confinement in the harem; as Ellen saw: “the poor child wanted liberty, as a bird pines in its cage, and cared for nothing else... there were a great many weary hours to get through.”
Indeed, it was a feature of harems through the centuries that they completely lacked mental stimulation.
It was different for the servants, who had their work, of course, and as we have seen, had the potential for actual careers within the harem hierarchy. “There was” as Leslie Peirce (op. cit.) says “little leisure time for ordinary residents of the harem.” And it must have been rewarding for musically talented women to be able to work professionally in one of the orchestras (and we must remember that comparable opportunities were almost entirely closed to Western women at the time). Embroidery and dressmaking were also important skills, and professional training was given. The most skilled in any field would often be employed in the Validé’s suite.
On the other hand, the harem offered Ellen herself continued security and comfort for the future. She would keep her probably quite generous income, and on top have free board and lodging in a palace (and let us not forget, that when she returned to England, she merely got board and lodgings in a small terraced house). And no doubt she would still have certain opportunities for travel in the future, as when Zeynab went in turn to Constantinople.
Furthermore, she was by now aged in her sixties, and can only have been considering her future in old age. I do not know if she had any relatives in England. In any case, she had only ever lived there as an employee, in the houses of others, and then – seemingly – only after approaching middle-age.
Her associations, so far as she reveals them, were actually with Malta, and this may have been where she lived before appearing in the 1851 Census, and where her elder sister, Anne Lydia, went back to live sometime after 1841. (It was expected at the time that one daughter would stay at home).
In fact a positive aspect of Imperial Harems was that they provided a form of social security for their inhabitants, which must have been especially welcomed in a world where poverty, indeed starvation, was commonplace. Against that, of course, would have to be balanced the fact that it was based on slavery, but whether that was always worse than the very constricting lives lived (and still too often lived) my many free women, both in the East and West may be perhaps open to question.
Ellen explained that “in ordinary Eastern households, when the mistress of a family dies, her slaves are probably sold... in the great harems, such as those belonging to the Khédive, the slaves are never, or very rarely sold again; but if any of them are unfortunate enough to lose their mistress by death, it is very difficult for them to find another, as there is a great prejudice against them as bringing ill-luck.”
However, they were still cared for. After Princess Zeynab’s death her staff (apart from Kopsès, who became the Second Princess’s companion) went to live “in a large house in Abbassieh, quite apart – house and maintenance provided for them – and perhaps some day they will be married.” Domestic servants back in England at the time might well have envied that; for them, unemployment, or old age might well have meant the workhouse.
(In fact after Zeynab’s death Ellen herself was still employed; her contract was with the Khedival household in general, and she expected to be found other work.
It must also have been flattering to Ellen to be asked to remain with Princess Zeynab; in turn no doubt Ismail, and Zeynab’s mother must have felt that they could rely on her as a good influence on their daughter, as well as someone whose discretion could be relied on.
We can only accept at face value Emmeline Lott’s claim that she gave up her job because of sickness. But, given her all too obvious hatred of the Khedival Court and all those in it, we might wonder if, in fact, the Khedival family were glad to see her go. In fact, given the constraints of life in the harem, she may have been only too glad in the end to have gone (and indeed, something appears to have embittered her towards the place and its occupants). As Ellen explained:
“When first Ismael Pasha became Viceroy, and European fashions were introduced into the harem, several English, French and Italian women were engaged to live there... After three or four years, most of the Europeans employed in the Viceroy’s harem were dismissed, as there were constant complaints on both sides. A few still remained in the families of the married sons and daughters.”
Appropriately, in this still very traditional world, Princess Zeynab moved from the rather fussy-over elaborate version of Western clothing that she had worn before, and started wearing something indeed rather more traditional:
"The general harem dress when warm weather set in was white Indian grass-cloth, more or less fine, made loose, and confined at the waist by a coloured sash, a ribbon to match usually being worn round the throat, and to tie back the hair." This kind of summer costume is shown in this picture, again from Sophia Lane-Poole's book:
To be continued...
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