Guild of Hypatia

2011-06-09T05:30:00.000-07:00

We left Ellen on the eve of the multiple royal marriages of 1873 installed in the grand, but uncomfortable New Hotel, after being forced to pack up all her belongings herself. Despite cold and wet weather she was still touring around Cairo, lamenting the bad state of repair of repair of some exceptional mosques, visiting the site of ancient Heliopolis – where nothing remained to be seen “except the obelisk, which is on such low ground that it is not visible until you are close upon it.”

At least the view of the Pyramids from the New Hotel was some compensation. And also of course there was the excitement of the approaching marriages, as well as the rather comical attempt to photograph the harem, described earlier.

This leads to a lengthy passage in her book, in which marriages and preparations are described in detail. This, after all, was something that not only plainly interested her, but which she felt that she could write freely about, even years later, in the 1890s, in retirement. She always remained very loyal to the memory of Princess Zeinab, at least, and indeed, in the preface to her book says that she only eventually published as “there is no one left to feel aggrieved at my publication, and I have spoken ill of none.”

After all, she must have been well aware of the rather scandalous books by “Emmeline Lott”, supposedly also an English governess at the Khedival court, although her existence as such, indeed her actual gender, is open to question. She would most certainly have not wished to be regarded as a second “Emmeline Lott”, though the contents of the books and their presentation are vastly different. Indeed, I’m sure that it was no coincidence that Ellen chose an impeccably respectable and long established publishing house, William Blackwood and Sons of Edinburgh and London. Anything appearing under their imprint was certainly not likely to offend anyone, particularly those in positions of power that Ellen had moved amongst.

She may, in fact, have made a veiled reference to “Emmeline Lott” in the preface to her book, when she wrote that:

“Great displeasure was manifested when (as occasionally happened) some distinguished visitor to the harem gave her impressions to the world at large.”

Her diaries, on which the book was based, would undoubtedly have said far more. After all, she appears to have kept them in sufficient detail to record even individual conversations. In fact sometimes I get the impression of a somewhat compulsive diarist. Her method of diary keeping seems to have been direct – she describes carrying a notebook about with her, and “wrote openly in it”, “making entries” about whatever she saw, experienced and heard. Whether or not she copied these notes into a main diary, in ink, later, we can only speculate.

Her diaries would make fascinating reading now. She must also surely have had photographs and other mementos. However, what became of them – indeed of any of Ellen’s possessions, I have been unable to discover. She may have had next of kin, if only distant, and certainly had an executor who arranged for her funeral and burial with her sister Anne Lydia, at Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. But so much of Ellen’s life remains enigmatic – and that, I’m sure, is how she wanted it.

Incidentally, it has not been possible to find out more from the records of her publishers, as these, together with much of her stock, was destroyed by bombing in the Second World War.

It is in her description of the marriages that we see Ellen at her best as an anthropologist, a career which, if it had been available to her, she would surely have excelled at. Even the tiniest details are recorded. But more than that, Ellen is interested in the customs and etiquette, and furthermore the reasons for the customs and etiquette. There are times when she does appear to be a true forerunner of the Egyptian social anthropologist Winifred Blackman (1872-1950), who also wrote a single book, The Fellahin of Upper Egypt (1927). The description of Winifred’s work by Al-Ahram Weekly in 2000 could apply equally to both women:

“Some of Blackman's subjects are esoteric, such as belief in magic, the evil eye and evil spirits (afarit ), while others - agriculture, industry and everyday village life - are more mundane, interweaved with topics as diverse as personal adornment and "the law of revenge." But the anthropologist was also a literary alchemist, transforming each chapter into a multi-faceted gem. Such is the abundance of detailed description, the vivid imagery, the apposite quotations or songs, the relevant anecdotes, the historical context and the fluid narration, that we are drawn into, and fascinated by, each successive chapter to the extent that we feel that we were there with her.”

(http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2000/481/bk3_481.htm , but the link appears to now be defunct?)

Expense no object
“I had a private view of the plate and jewels for each bride,” Ellen wrote “but as they were pretty much the same in each instance, I will only particularise one… In a large saloon were thirty or forty women, all carefully arranging the jewels on crimson velvet cushions. There were tiaras, bracelets, necklaces, brooches, medallions, clasps, buckles, butterflies, earrings, and sprays, all of gold and diamonds, a massive gold circlet for the waist with an immense diamond clasp. There were other precious stones but diamonds greatly predominated, as being the most costly. Over each cushion was firmly fixed a wire-work cover which looked like lace, and while protecting the jewels allowed them to be seen.”

And there was much more:

“I was then taken to two other rooms which were kept locked, and were full of stands on which were arranged the different articles of gold and silver plate for the new ménage. There were about sixty stands, on which were dishes, plates, looking-glasses (of silver or gold), the little jewelled filigree gold cups for coffee, amber mouthpieces for pipes, &c., &c. The plate was, like the jewels, secured by wire covers which allowed them to be seen.”

This, remember, was for only one of the brides, Princess Fatma, Ishmail’s second daughter. It’s little surprise, then, that Ishmail is still described in some works as “Egypt’s spendthrift khedive” (Colonialism: an international social, cultural and political encyclopedia (2003) Ed. Melvin E. Page, Santa Barbara [California]: ABC-CLIO Inc.

Ishmail may, or may not, have judged public opinion correctly by displaying this vast wealth. However, he did so:

“The trousseau for each wedding was on a certain day carried through the town under an escort of soldiers. The streets through which it passed, and the balconies to the houses and hotels, were lined with people to witness the spectacle, which the fine wire covers guarded but did not conceal.”

Ellen then describes the marriage traditions, which took place n 26 January 1873:

“No ceremony, either religious or civil, is performed in [the] presence of both the contracting parties. A large party of relations and friends on both sides are assembled in the house of the parents of the bride. The gentlemen are in the selamlik, the ladies in the harem. The bridgeroom signs the contract in the presence of witnesses, and two or three of the most influential persons (generally relatives) go into the harem to obtain from the bride’s own lips authority to sign the contract in her name. These gentlemen are preceded by a couple of eunuchs crying “Dustoor!” which signifies “Get out of the way, attend to Mahometan [sic] customs,” and all women hide themselves as the gentlemen approach. The bride is in an inner room, surrounded by her nearest relations and friends; the door is ajar, but a thick curtain is drawn before it. The gentlemen stop outside, and one of them asks the important question, “N, wilt thou have this man to be thy wedded husband?” There is a dead silence, for, willing or unwilling, it is not etiquette for the lady to be so easily won. After a pause the question is repeated, and again there is no response.

“Now I have been told that if there is no reply to the third time of asking, there is an end to the business, and the parties all go home again without any marriage taking place I don’t suppose this often occurs, but there is a long pause between the second and third times of asking, to give time for the ladies to work on the bride, and induce her to pronounce the equivalent to “I will.” At last it is said, and then the gentlemen go back to the selamlik, and the contract is signed. In each of the weddings I am about to describe, a royal salute in each case announced the accomplishment of the signature.”

Whatever the mutterings in the back streets of Cairo, in Ellen’s book the day was full only of brightness and entertainment.

“There was plenty of movement in the streets on this day, gay harem carriages flitting about, their occupants distinctly visible in their gleaming yashmaks and bright coloured feridjees… It happened that the annual races began on this day, and… the hotels are always filled with Alexandrians coming to see them. I was told that Sir George Chetwynd sent a horse to run on this occasion, but it was beaten easily – I suppose from the difference of ground and of temperature.”

One of the races was “a dromedary race… very attractive from its novelty to Europeans.”

The Sir George Chetwynd mentioned was the 4th Baronet (1849-1917), of Brocton Hall, Staffordshire, notable in his day as a racehorse breeder and competitor, and author of Racing reminscences and experiences of the turf (1891). Presumably the Cairo races were not amongst his most agreeable reminiscences. His interest in an Egyptian race is indicative of the growing interest in, and involvement with, Egypt by wealthy Europeans, that in the end was to be Ishmail’s downfall.

But for the moment, the House of Muhammad Ali looked, from the outside at least, to be secure. Following the races, on 18 January 1873, came “the anniversary of the Khédive’s accession, and a ball is usually given in honour of it.

“It is held at Gezireh, in the State apartments occupied by the Empress of the French [Empress Eugenie, 1826-1920, deposed 1870] .during her visit to Egypt in 1869 at the opening of the Suez Canal.

“They are magnificent apartments, and the position of the palace on the Nile, with the beautiful gardens all illuminated, combine to make a ball there a sort of realisation of fairyland. Invitations are ardently coveted, and liberally given – on this occasion almost too liberally, for some persons complained of being crowded.”

Ellen roundly scolded the complainers: “There is plenty of space, but of course if everyone will rush to the ball-room, it may become rather too full for comfort.”

Next: the marriage ceremonies begin, described at length by Ellen.

2011-06-08T07:12:00.000-07:00

It's been some time now since I last wrote for the "Guild of Hypatia". I'm glad that it has attracted some interest from around the world.

Although I promised that the series on Ellen Chennels was "to be continued", that continuation has been a long time coming, now, and the next chapter is very long overdue!

In particular, two e-mails have been interesting. The first was from Mr. Terry Walz, who agrees with me that Emmeline Lott's book "Nights in the Harem" was not written by a governess to the Khedival family!

I'd like to quote Mr. Walz's e-mail at length, as his comments are very intresting:

"It [i.e. 'Nights in the Harem'] displays an unusual grasp of the geography of Cairo in the 1850s, maybe 1860s - I even want to say a man's grasp - the location of markets, the different nationalities - and yet a poor grasp of Arabic (odd spellings that seem almost correct, but are not)... the 'mohaddetyn' in the title comes from Lane's 'Manners and Customs', and perhaps some of the other descriptions from Lane or Lane Poole, or Sophia Poole, and even Burton. Yet they would not have made the same mistakes in Arabic that she did.

You're quite right to conclude that it was entirely imagined, and yet it is interesting that she used an old eunuch - usually the most terrifying, horrifying of creatures in Victorian literature - as her central character and endowed him with some sympathetic feelings."

I personally think that Mr. Walz has found the answer to the puzzle. The books by "Emmeline Lott" are indeed by a man - the titles and content suggest this so very strongly. Who, however, I have no idea, and perhaps we can only speculate, now.

One thing seems for sure - my researches now and since have failed to find any trace of an "Emmeline Lott." I'm increasingly of the opinion, therefore, that the works attributed to her should not, therefore be regarded as history, but rather as fiction.

The second e-mail was from Mr. Michael Ward, who has asked me for more information about the visit to the Khedival family by the Earl and Countess of Dudley. Mr. Ward points out that in turn the Khedive stayed with them in England, at Dudley House, London.

I'm still researching this. My initial thoughts are that it was associated with Ishmail's plans for the economic expansion of Egypt - the Dudleys were very well-connected in banking and industrial, as well as political circles. The Earl of Dudley would, in short, have been a very useful person for the Khedive to know.

If anyone has any further information about this, please pass it on to Mr. Ward and the Guild of Hypatia.

And now, where precisely did I leave poor Miss Chennells?

Isis Yule Prayer

2009-12-17T04:26:00.001-08:00

Isis Yule Prayer

Yule Tide returns

As the candle slowly burns

Sending out Blessings Bright

Guided by the might of Isis light.

Throughout the darkness she’ll shine

Showering her glory Divine

To all of those who have learned

They're Her children - returned.

Giving back as we are blessed

Gifts to others who have less

Her joy then is spread

We see no-one goes unfed.

The light of Isis reaches out

Erasing negativity and doubt

That Her Will be done

Restoring balance where their were none.

Her warm invigorating light shines beyond the dark

Calling to all through a tiny spark Yule Tide Returns

Come warm beside Her flames

Merge with Isis of 10'000 names.

Rosie Weaver

Personal Space and Sacred Earth: spiritual work space

2009-04-24T08:46:00.000-07:00

Spring is here. The blossoms are showing in many places and once again we can actually head out of doors.

Just sitting, feeling the breezes and experiencing the smells of the earth are both centering and ultimately healing. There is a spiritual side to this relaxation. I have always found disturbing that the two things of nature and spirituality could not appear to be mixed in one spot. I will not need to seek a church, a circle or a shrine else where if I can but build a space here to pass into as part of my day.

So I decided to try again to capture both a sacred space where my feet meet the earth in a private spot near my back door. Finally, after much disaster in the past occurring to my small sacred space from invading neighboring dogs there is a fence being built to block off the end of this long empty space. In that space what survived were two dwarf apple trees and a climbing rose bush that the dogs did not bother with. So now the space is free of traffic that had been its focus and energy before - forcible abandoned by the disregard of others.

This space that would otherwise become over grown/abused is now ready to become a sacred area with a little work, that can be used to re-focus life and energy within. The plan is to sit out once more the Kuan Yin brass statue on the flat gray stone near the back door and plant more field roses and a dog wood. Then place a support arbor for the climbing rose, who has no where to climb. On this arbor wind chimes and even small prayer flags can be hung. The entire area will be open to birds, small animals, toads, frogs, fae, elementals, bees and butterflies. Water will be offered there. A small strips of bird seeds hung. The area becomes inviting, energized and focused.

The biggest "sacred" place I would say that inspired me was the Redwoods in Oregon and California. I could not imagine any thing better than to own a small piece of ground that these giant trees lived on. I had seen this believe it or not. There were privately owned small acreages of land with Redwood trees on them. The saddest of these pieces of land were the ones that the owners were preparing to log off for profit and then sell the bare land - I witnessed this as a child with my first visit to the Redwoods. I am thankful that there are national forests to keep safe what is found on the land. But the ultimate for me would be to own land and then live with what was present there. A beautiful example of this is found here at the "Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America" - the natural places to celebrate and practice the rituals of life.

Now back to reality. Most of us do not have wide parks and local shrines to visit. Most of us do not have time to each day draw ourselves to these places to rest, recharge and center ourselves. And there is a majority of people who don't see value in this either - these social or religious attitudes prevent the building of such needed public areas - for people who do find such places valuable.

But for those of us who do see value in it, but do not live where we can enter any of these amazing places to do our spiritual work - we must create this space. We can create this space out of nothing. We can create this space through experimenting with different areas in our homes, apartments or where ever we live. We can find a space that is not being used and create a sense of expanse and energy. So the little alley between properties will be my space to live in, work in and place objects that are important to me.

Though this space is not Redwoods or a mountain or a spring or a waterfall.... it is a space I can place things in and invite energies and beings to and keep to my self where I can think and do spiritual work.

That is my shrine, and no one else need know. You can make one too.

Ostara, chocolate eggs and Mother Goose

2009-04-09T12:46:00.000-07:00

Ostara, chocolate eggs and Mother Goose

During our childhood, my sister 'Julie' and I celebrated every Easter time together by seeing which one of us could consume the most chocolate eggs in the shortest amount of time, (hopefully before my parents awoke).

I can still see my younger sister now, surrounded by shiny wrappers with her face covered in chocolate holding her tummy; and me having to call my mum because she was about to be sick everywhere.

Our family, friends & neighbours all gave eggs to us. Throughout the neighbourhood it was a pretty standard practise, most families to indulged their offspring by purchasing a wide array of Easter eggs.

The eggs were proudly displayed upon the shelf like glittering jewels; until that special sunday when the chocolate fest commenced.

On reflection, I can’t think why we were allowed to just munch our ways through mounds of choccy, but I remember how excited we got as children at the prospect of which eggs we were going to unwrap & eat first.

We talked about it for weeks beforehand, and got up as early as we had on xmas morning with the same level of anticipation to be the first to get our hands on those brightly coloured boxes of our hearts desire.

One of the other peculiar practices foisted upon us as children at school consisted of the annual ‘Grande Easter Bonnet parade/competition’.The lucky contestants were lined up like embarrassed Carmen Miranda’s’ along the length of the playground all wearing the offending home made articles that had taken many of the more competitive mothers weeks to construct; prior to the event.

The winning prize (normally an Easter egg) usually went to some child whose father was a set designer for ‘Crossroads’ or of similar ilk.

Later on in life I learned that the word ‘Easter’ derives from Germanic Goddess of Spring called Ostara or Eastre she also has connections with the Greek Goddess of Dawn/Springtime named ‘Eos’. The word for the direction ‘East’ also stems from Eos.

The ancient word for the springtime was thought to be named ‘Eastre’.

Christianity campaigned to win over Pagan holidays through fostering the celebrations themselves and pilfering our more ancient symbolism, finally staking claim to its truer meanings & origins.

Ancient Egyptians held a widespread belief that the universe itself was egg shaped.The womb of the Great Goddess was seen to be an egg.

Creation stories of Gods and Goddesses being born form eggs were well known, Hathor the great goddess of nature shape shifted into a Nile goose called ‘The Great Cackler’ and gave birth to the sun.

Today’s remnants of the old creation stories linger with us still in the form of the pantomime character ‘Mother Goose’ the goose that laid the golden egg.

A common practice which greatly predates Christianity was the painting of eggs by the Anglo Saxon folk who buried the brightly coloured eggs as offerings to Mother Earth buried in the hope that prayers be answered.

The Christian resurrection of Jesus Christ takes also stems from more ancient stories of the birth, death & resurrection of the Isis’s husband Osiris, God of renewal.

Many similar creation stories have been adapted by various cultures/Pantheons throughout the ages with an element of spiritual truth running through each.

The Spring-time symbolism of eggs/ Easter egg hunts/egg decorating/hares/rabbitsand rebirth filter through the ages globally and in time honoured fashion continue to do so from a more ancient nature based religion.

This year when I hand over Easter eggs to my children I shall be pointing out that theirs more to the humble choccy egg than meets the eye.

Hopefully before the ‘choccy fest’ commences they may be interested enough to take some time and learn a little more.

NAVIGIUM ISIDIS

2009-03-05T02:38:00.000-08:00

On March 5th & 6th an ancient festival took place in Egypt and ancient Rome known as ‘Navigium Isidis’.
It was a great community event, accounts tell of some fabulous processions perhaps our equivalent now would be Notting Hill Carnival held in London or Mardi Gras in New Orleans.

In honour Isis and in remembrance of ‘Navigium Isidis’ I take a little wooden boat to the sea and launch it with my own personal prayers.
Luckily I live very close to a fishing quarter here in Hastings and so it is the ideal place to do this. My little Isis ship will set sail from the fisherman’s beach. The following poem I wrote with these thoughts ….

NAVIGIUM ISIDIS

Many moons ago in the Black lands far away
People joined the procession of Navigium Isidis
Celebrated upon this day.

All our current carnivals with floats derived from this
A mosaic of musical merriment; masks & costumes headed towards the port,
Where the boat of Isis waits; laden with offerings of every sort.

Before She sets sail
She is purified and Blessed
The boat represents Isis
Honoured throughout Her Fest.

She is patroness of sailors
The river Nile and all the seas,
She steers humanity on a journey
Bringing worldly sufferings to ease.

The Mast is raised, as the gentle spring breeze blows
The procession lets out a cheer as the ship of Isis departs,
Off across the waters or maybe to the stars above
Isis is Mistress of All Magick keeper of human hearts.

Out across the distance the Ship of Isis diminishes from sight
The procession continues to celebrate; as daytime turns to night,
Navigium Isidis was celebrated back through the mists of time
Yet still little boats are launched honouring Isis, the Great Mother Divine.

Rosie Weaver. March 09

.

2009-02-05T08:02:00.001-08:00

One of my new friends and I have been working with some of the Fellowship of Isis
Rituals and Mystery Drama’s recently.
I read a brilliant article by the Priestess 'Caroline Wise' this week saying just how deep and meaningful these rites are for her and I have to agree 100%.
Even some of the rituals that I have done several times over the years always bring fresh & often profound personal insights.
I’ve been a member of the fellowship of Isis since 1976, and am delighted to see now that all of the rituals and mystery dramas are freely available online for members of the fellowship of Isis to download.
It is such a good idea to have access to the beautiful rites written by one of the co- founders of the F.O.I ‘Lady Olivia Robertson’ whom wrote these works of art whilst in a trance state; it is thanks to her that we may all benefit from these Goddess given gifts.
Over the years I have been privileged to share & celebrate some of the rituals with fellow Isians (as Isis followers often are called).
Other times it has not been possible to link up with other devotee’s and so I perform the Rites solo here at home, from my personal shrine to Isis.
I’m always able to adapt the rituals to suit one person and have found creative ways of performing the Mystery Drama’s solo too!
In a group situation the members would be ‘playing’ the roles themselves; during the rite.
For solo practitioners however I would begin by looking at the various roles included of a specific drama from the Fellowship of Isis Liturgy, next I ‘Google’ images on the internet to find nice pictures that resonates with me for the given roles and characters involved.
It might be for example; of a God or Goddess or any number of characters from various Pantheons, but I always manage to find nice images to use for a ritual/mystery play.
For more creative folk I recommend making your own images through painting/drawing/collage.
Often background music is also recommended to play during the Rite.
Thanks again to the magic of the internet we may also find sites that allow us free access to the required sounds.

For the rite itself I am fortunate enough to have my computer next to my Shrine, which enables me to light my candles & incense, then I will be able to bring the character images up on my computer & also play the required background music as I continue solo with the rite.
The entire effect of being to use evocative images to accompany the rite reminds me of a modern day Victorian puppet theatre.
I can narrate the story of the Mystery Drama myself as I go along and use the characters on screen to add more meaning to the ritual itself.
It’s great fun to try the various role playing of the characters as you read out each of the individual characters ‘lines’ and the beauty of it is that you may keep it as simple or elaborate as you wish.
You may for example like to include images of scenery and further images of the ritual regalia which may be called for in the play. All of these items may be pasted onto one document which you may scroll down to, as required during the play/ritual.

If you’d like to try this for yourself the Rites & Drama’s may be found at:

http://lotuspharia.freeyellow.com/thecircleofisis/id4.html

May I suggest to begin with you try the Rites from the Liturgy booklets of ‘Dea’ and ‘Panthea’.

For those that would like to follow a structured study course please contact me here at:
The Iseum of the Solar Goddess
Blessings
Rosie Weaver
Prs.H. Prs. A

Biddy (a poem for Imbolc)

2009-01-22T03:32:00.000-08:00

Biddy

Early one February morn, a little old Biddy
Comes a knocking on my door.

Says she to I;
“Can you spare some time and hospitality for the poor.”
Say I to her:
“welcome, please come on in, have some brew and a warm.”

She smiles back at me with a face older than the hills
And as the wind whistles outside,
She sups her tea and takes her fill.

Says she to I:
“I’ve been known by many names
Some have called me Bride and Brigid of the flames.
I’ll take you on a journey so that you may see my life,
I bring a gift of inspiration
And bestow Blessings on every wife.
I be a midwife and a healer
A Smithy, poet and a Queen,
I walk between both worlds,
Betwixt the unseen and the seen.

I be the spirit that dances with Maidens
Whom herald in the Spring,
I be the spirit of lovers kissing
Exchanging vows with a wedding ring.

I be the spirit of mothers birthing
Bringing forth, a brand new life,
I be the spirit of human toiling
Overcoming sadness and human strife.”

Say I to her:
“I’m honoured by your presence,
truly I don’t know where to begin.”
Says she to I:
“Child, you returned my Blessings
The moment you let me in.”

I turn to her with gratitude
Overwhelmed by both gains, and thoughts of loss,
To find that she has vanished
But left behind her Bridgets cross.

A symbol of corn woven into death and all that shall be reborn
Says I to myself:
“I’ll remember Biddy each sunset and Bridget each new dawn.”

I hang up the corn dolly in my kitchen, for all to view
Then take my old copper kettle, and put it on for another brew.

I gaze out of the window and see Biddy throughout the land
And although she’s no longer with me,
I know that she’s always their at hand.

Rosie Weaver 09

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2009-01-09T07:04:00.000-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Four weddings and a funeral

In my last post, about harems, I mentioned the four weddings, announced in the winter of 1872, that Ismail hoped would turn away from tradition, towards Western-style, monogamous, marriages for the Khedival family. By doing this he no doubt hoped that the family would become more acceptable in Western opinion, and at this time Ismail was anxious to show the West how “enlightened” a ruler he was, particularly by removing the dangerous taint of slavery. (After all, that alone might have been sufficient as a casus belli for European governments looking for any justification to invade Egypt).

As Ellen explained:

“Mohammed Ali [the founder of the dynasty] had the same kind of harem as the Sultan, consisting exclusively of slaves, and this custom had been continued by his successors, down to the Khedive. But the latter in mature age wished to adopt the European law of one wife, and direct succession from father to son... the second he succeeded in establishing by fixing the succession in the person of his eldest son, Mohammed Tewfik Pasha, and the first, by restricting each of his sons to one wife of equal rank with himself.”

In the event, however, it was all perhaps too late. Only three years later, from 1875 onwards, as soon as Ismail seemed unlikely to be able to repay Egypt’s debt to Western banks, the European powers increasingly exercised political power in Egypt, and in 1879 they deposed Ismail.

Still, the threatening international situation outside the harem walls was not mentioned by Ellen in her book. She was surely aware of it, as she had many friends in the Western expatriate community, and indeed was to suffer from Ismail’s downfall in her own way, by losing her job. However, no doubt like most people she simply hoped for the best, and got on with everyday life.

Besides, she accepted things how they were far more than many other English governesses at the time; perhaps because she may not have been brought up in England.

She did not, on the whole, tend to see herself “as representing a higher civilisation, whose ways English governesses were employed to impart”. (Ruth Brandon, Other peoples’ daughters: the life and times of the governess, Wiedenfeld & Nicholson, 2008). And that not only seems to have made life in Egypt easier for her, but may also have made her more acceptable to Ismail, Zeynab, and the Second Princess, who were, after all, happy to retain her.

And besides, for the moment, there were four weddings to look forward to!

At this point in history, no-one seems to have questioned Ismail’s right to choose his son’s wives himself. Yet that too was on the point of change. As F. Robert Hunter, in his book Egypt under the Khedives, 1805-1879 (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1984) says: “never again would their [i.e. the Khedives’] power be so absolute or despotic as it had been in the 1805-1879 period.”

So once again, we find that Ellen witnessed the very end of traditional Ottoman rule in Egypt. Nothing would ever quite be the same again, and in the 1890s, when she turned to her old travel-journal to write her book, she can only have been aware of just how much had changed, especially as she seems to have kept in touch with private events in the Khedival family.

Ismail had no difficulty finding suitable brides. “Among the descendants of Mohammed Ali [i.e. those of equal rank to the princes] there were many to choose from,” Ellen wrote. “To Tewfik Pasha, the eldest son, was given Amina Hanem… the great-great-granddaughter of Mohammed Ali. To Hussein Pasha, the second son, was given Ain-el-Heiât, the… great-granddaughter of Mohammed Ali. To Hassan Pasha, third son of the Khédive, was given Khadija Hanem, the granddaughter of Mohammed Ali… the Khédive’s second daughter, Fatma Hanem, was to be married to Tousson Pasha, son of the late Viceroy, Saïd Pasha, and grandson of Mohammed Ali.”

Above:Prince Tewfik, the heir; later Khedive
Below: Princess Amina (Emina), his wife

Above: Princess Fatima
Below, Princess Ain-el-Heiat

The marriages were to be celebrated lavishly. “We were told that the festivities in honour of each marriage were to last a week, so that a whole month would be devoted to fêtes and rejoicings.”

Meanwhile, Ellen still found time to appreciate Egypt’s historical monuments. She visited Old Cairo; the ancient mosque of Amrou, which she believed to be the oldest in Egypt, if not in an Islamic country; and once again to see the preparations for the departure of the Mahmal procession to Mecca.

She deplored the lack of maintenance to some monuments, such as the Mosque of Sultan Hassan, which she described as “one of the handsomest in Cairo”, noting that “it is falling into decay, as no on ever seems to think of repairing these monuments of past ages. There is a beautiful marble pavement in mosaic, but it is a good deal injured.” Plainly Ellen was a conservationist before her time!

The Mosques of Sultan Hassan (above), and Amr(ou) (beneath) in the 19th century

She also went to see the site of the ancient city of Heliopolis, but was disappointed: “no vestige remains of the ancient city except the obelisk, which is on such low ground that it is not visible until you are close upon it. Like Memphis, [i.e. the ancient capital of Egypt] its ruins have been appropriated to construct new edifices; and none of the mighty remains are to be seen which still exists in Upper Egypt.”

(The ancient city of Heliopolis, not to be confused with a modern suburb of Cairo with that name, was one of the most important religious centres in Ancient Egypt, particularly in solar worship. It was supposedly the site of a famous miracle in which the God Horus fed several thousand people with only seven loaves; this miracle was later appropriated by Christianity.

It was first settled in Predynastic times, and was one of the major cities of Egypt for many centuries, but declined during the mediaeval era due to the growth of Cairo, to the north-west. Ellen was correct in stating that much of its remains were used for later building).

Ellen’s colleague, Mr. Mitchell, wished to see the actual departure of the Mahmal procession. He had tried twice before, but had failed, “as it is very difficult to find out when it will be). Mr. Mitchell “did not go very near, as he saw many unfriendly looks cast at him. A few years ago, if a European had thus ventured among them, he would have been pelted at the very least; but now it is easier to see such things.” Mr. Mitchell later made the most of his experience, writing an article about it for the Times newspaper, titled “Pilgrims to Mecca”, which was published on 7 December 1876.

On 25 December, a large funeral procession passed along the Chourbrah road, and was recorded by Ellen: “First came a number of Arabs on foot, and four camels laden with large bags filled with provisions. A man rode on each of the camels behind the bags, and distributed from them oranges, dates, and bread to the multitude of followers. This is always customary, as they have a long way to walk, and require food to support them. After the camels came a number of soldiers; and lastly the bier, with several women wailing and making a dismal noise; [presumably ululating] then immediately behind the bier were the chief mourners, and a crowd of Arabs followed the procession.”

Unhappily, the funeral turned out to be that of “the grandson of Mohammed Ali, and the half-brother of the young lady about to be married to Hassan Pasha.”

Ellen a proto-anthropologist?

It is the careful recording of such details as this that help make Ellen’s book so valuable as a historical document.

And as Ruth Brandon says in her book Other people's daughters: the life and times of the governess [op.cit.]:

"This marks an important difference between... [governesses] - who judged the wold from the standpoint of the imperial power they represented - and proto-anthropologists like Freya Stark" (1893-1993; notable English female explorer and writer). Or, it might be said, Winifred Blackman, whose book The fellahin of Upper Egypt, first published in 1927, remains a classic study of Egyptian society.

After all, Ellen was not the only English governess who had obtained a job with ruling family and who later published their memoirs; others included Anna Leonowens, on whose volumes of memoirs a best-selling book, Anna and the King of Siam, by Margaret Landon, and later a famous movie, The King and I were based, and Miss Maria Graham, who wrote about her experiences as governess to the Emperor of Brazil. But neither Anna or Maria observed their surroundings in such detail as Ellen. Had she been born later, indeed, it is possible that she might, like Winifred, have studied anthropology; she seems to not only have had a genuine interest in the society that she found herself in, but she had an unusual talent for noticing, and recording the details that make our picture of that society so much fuller.

Ellen starts to feel like a railway-porter
A great inconvenience for the educational staff at this time was that they had to leave their house in Choubrah to stay in the New Hotel, Cairo, to make way for a group of “distinguished visitors from Constantinople, who were expected shortly, and would be present at the approaching weddings”. They not only had to move their personal possessions, but “nothing was to be left behind… the probability was that all the furniture we had used would be turned out of the house… if it was useful it would be appropriated; if not, it would be thrown away.”

The “distinguished visitors” later turned out to be “fourteen Turks, and… one was a great personage, as he ate alone. He must have been of the old school of Turks, as none of the Khédive’s family ever eat alone.”

It was, in effect, moving house for them. “This was a great trouble to us. Mrs. Freeland had tables covered with all sorts of little ornaments, and I had quantities of books, which were then well arranged in an excellent book-case, and always accessible, and were now to be packed up in boxes, which renders them practically useless.”

I can certainly sympathise with Ellen there, having once or twice had to move my own books!

Unsurprisingly, after having packed up all her belongings, Ellen “began to realise something of what a railway porter may experience after a hard day’s work.”

Although the rooms at the New Hotel were good, they were dark, and cold. The hotel was “full of draughts, and the sun never penetrated into the rooms, owing to the great balcony which surrounded both the first and second storeys on three sides of the building.”

The New Hotel, Cairo, in the 19th Century

“There was one great advantage, however”, Ellen went on, always ready to make the best of a situation. “And that was the promenade at the top of the house, from whence you had an extensive view for miles around, and also saw everything that passed in the road between the hotel and the Ezbekeah Gardens.”

She certainly loved the view. “As my windows faced the east, I always saw the sun rise over the Mokattam Hills. On the 12th of January [1873] it rose at five minutes past seven, and I watched it set (from the top of the hotel) a little to the west of the Pyramids of Gizeh at a quarter past five.”

Certainly sunsets over Gizeh can be spectacular during the winter months, and you can also see what Ellen saw, by taking a look at http://www.pyramidcam.com/

Like Ellen, I’m sure you’ll find the sunsets, framed by the Pyramids, can be really beautiful to watch.

The grooms arrive - unsuspectingly!
Meanwhile, back at the harem, it was not surprising that “nothing was talked of but the approaching weddings. Prince Hassan was daily expected from England, and a suprise awaited him.” Indeed, he was to have a surprise, that was certainly no exaggeration. He had been told that: “he was to go round the world, as the Duke of Edinburgh had done, and when he arrived in Egypt, believing he was about to make the grand tour, he was informed that he was to be married!” Presumably the deception was merely a practical joke.

(The Duke of Edinburgh referred to was Alfred, “Affie”, 1844-1900, the second son of Queen Victoria. In 1867 he had undertaken a world tour, during which he came close to being assassinated).

Hassan arrived with his younger half-brother, Mahmoud. Mahmoud, it seems, whilst studying in England had forgotten how to speak Turkish, but found “to his great joy that Kopsès could speak English”, and so “ran around with her.” (Not surprisingly; a raving beauty such as Kopsès would have undoubtedly had more attractions to a young man than simply a command of English!)

Indeed, it was no doubt due to the charms of some of the young women in the harem that “it was quite an innovation” that Hassan and Mahmoud had been invited there at all. “‘It is a jolly place’, he [Mahmoud] told Kopsès, ‘and they let me run around as I like, but I wish you were there to talk with me.’” But of course!

Ellen was also pleased, of course, that under her instruction Princess Zeynab had learned English, and so “should see and talk to her brothers.”

Even when in Egypt, Hassan seems to have been kept in the dark about his intended bride. Ellen explained that it was, however, inevitable “unless their customs are entirely changed, and the seclusion of women abolished.” Indeed, he only seems to have found out by chance who he was to be married to. Princess Zeynab had a photograph album containing portraits of the “ladies of the harem.” Whilst showing her brother this book, “she put her hand down on one [photo] and tried to turn over the page.” (Behaviour that, unless deliberately intended to give Hassan a hint, suggests that she was still somewhat immature?) In this way, evidently, Hassan found out who he was to marry.

Oh, what a picture...
Relating to this, Ellen reveals another glimpse of the times. “Photography was quite a mania all the time I was in Egypt”, she wrote “and as the princesses could not be taken by any of the chief photographers of the town, women went into the harem to exercise the art. Some the photographs thus taken were passable, but none first rate.” (Indeed, looking carefully at the photo of Kopsès, it seems that she is actually trying not to start laughing!)

Photographs during the 1870s were commonly done on plates prepared by one or another of the various “collodion processes” – wet, dry, and collodion emulsion (although emulsion did not come into use until later in the decade). It would have presented considerable difficulties when photographing the “ladies of the harem”, as wet collodion plates had to be used almost as soon as they were coated. This would give a photographer no more than about 10 minutes to coat the plate, take the photo, and develop the plate.

To get round this problem, “dry collodion” plates were in use, which did not have to be used and developed immediately after coating. (They involved a coating that prevented the collodion from drying). But dry collodion plates were variable in quality, and also needed a very long exposure time. (Kopsès had probably been standing absolutely still, without blinking, for several minutes).
A dry plate might have been prepared outside the harem, and brought in by the woman photographer, but she would have had to have needed a dark-room somewhere close by, inside the harem, for wet plates. Considering the huge amount of equipment that she would have needed to arrange and use, it was hardly surprising that, in Ellen’s opinion, “they were not skilful, and did not produce good likenesses.”

So, when Princess Zeynab reached the age of 13, and wished to be photographed again, as a young woman, a way of allowing a more skilled photographer to do the job had to be found. Ellen herself had her photo taken by the famous Abdullah brothers, in Constantinople, active from ca. 1870 to 1899, court photographers to the Sultan. The firm later also had studios in Cairo and Alexandria. (How wonderful if one of the photos of her has survived, somewhere!) But Zeynab had to engage an Egyptian photographer, as “he, being an Egyptian subject, could not possibly sell or show the portraits to any other persons”, something which “would violate all ideas of oriental propriety.”

But: “the man could not, however, be admitted to the harem; the business was to go on in the garden, and it was rather difficult to find a place not too sunny or too windy. The only shade was made by the walls, as there were no trees, and that was a shade which varied each half-hour, so that there was a continual shifting of the apparatus. Several eunuchs stood by, but they gave no assistance whatever. The poor man had to do everything himself…”

Not only Zeynab, but all the other women in the palace were also photographed on this occasion; due to the need to accommodate the changes in light and shadow, by moving the props and equipment around the garden, the work took two entire days.

The results, unfortunately, were not a success (although in fact Zeynab does appear to have had her photo taken at around this time). But as Ellen says: “a first-rate European would hardly have succeeded under such circumstances. No-one gave him the slightest help, and he was not allowed to have an assistant. Every time that the changing light or wind… necessitated a move, there was not only his own apparatus to shift, but a complete paraphernalia around the Princess – arm-chairs, table, cushions, flower-stands, &c., besides a great canvas screen, which had to be held up every now and then.” And of course, he would have had to coat a fresh plate on each occasion, and possibly develop it immediately afterwards, too. In the Egyptian sun, he might have had less than 10 minutes to do this, before the plate dried.

One of the more successful photos of Princess Zeynab evidently taken at around this time

It was not surprising that “the proofs came, and were utter failures. “Some of us looked like dwarfs, others like giantesses. The perspective was at fault in all,- some hands came out as clubs, and plump figures swelled into something Gampish. [i.e. resembling the obese character Sarah Gamp in Dicken’s novel Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-44)] The Princess tore her own likeness into the smallest fragments, but laughed heartily at the caricatures of her friends.”

Ellen had also had her “likeness” taken on this occasion, with the others, but it turned out to be no better than theirs. “One of the slaves, who always expressed a great regard for me, begged the Princess to give her my photograph… and some time after the girl showed it to me as a triumph of art. I got possession of it by ruse, destroyed the atrocious thing, and presented her instead with a very good likeness which had been taken by Abdullah on my last visit to Constantinople”.

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2009-01-01T07:33:00.000-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Life in the harem

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.”

19th century fantasy about the harem: "Odalisque", by Renoir

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

Indeed, the turn of the century was a period in which the Ottoman harem was looked at factually, from the point of view of actual residence in one, in such books as A Turkish woman’s European impressions by Zeynab Hanoum (Seeley, Service & Co., 1913), and An Englishwoman in a Turkish harem, by Grace Ellison (Methuen, 1915).

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.

Only inside, on the title page, do we get a fuller story. This reads: The English governess in Egypt. HAREM LIFE in Egypt and Constantinople. By Emmeline Lott. And only in very tiny letters underneath, do we find that she was not abducted to the seraglio, as it were, but was Formerly governess to his Highness the Grand Pacha [sic] Ibrahim, son of his Highness Ismael Pacha, Viceroy of Egypt. Even so the thrill-seeker might still read on, especially as the frontispiece, opposite, shows what is supposedly “Emmeline Lott” in Ottoman dress, the lower half of her face covered by a veil. (Ellen, on the other hand, constantly remarked that she exclusively wore European dress).

Sensationalism or fact?

Emmeline Lott's book

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].”

It was not even an approximation of the truth; in short, it was set in the “harems” of popular imagination, rather than real-life ones. It is the written equivalent of the picture shown above, and the embarrassment that it must have caused to the Khedive and his family can only be imagined. Indeed, whether Nights in the harem - indeed, certain parts of Harem life - were actually written by Emmeline Lott (whoever she in fact was) might even be debatable on stylistic grounds; although it is mere supposition, I have the feeling that the books may have been “spiced up” a bit, by the publisher. (Indeed, given that Emmeline Lott does not seem to have been British, could they even have been translations?)

Ellen was amongst the last people to be associated with an Egyptian imperial harem in its traditional form. As we shall see, it relied on slavery, which was officially abolished in Egypt in 1869 (although it took some considerable time to die out in practice, and was still widely practiced in the imperial palaces in the 1870s). It also did not fit in with the modern, westernised, Egypt that Ismail was busy creating. Indeed, Ismail was the last Khedive to follow the traditional Ottoman practice of a ruler having several wives and a number of concubines, who, together with other members of the family, notably the Queen Mother, had traditionally lived together in the palace harem.

In the winter of 1872, four royal marriages between Ismail’s children and their cousins were announced. And, as Ellen put it: “rather a new state of things was to be inaugurated with them”. In fact these marriages were intended to be, for the first time in the Khedival family, monogamous. Each married couple was also to have their own home. A further departure from the traditional system, that of primogeniture to establish a clear line of succession as Khedive, had been made much earlier; in fact it had been followed by all the descendants of Muhammad Ali (Ismail’s grandfather).

Originally, in Turkey, the succession of the Sultanate had been decided by chance and – often – ruthlessness; the throne could go to any male in the family.
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

One of the most famous Ottoman Valide Sultans: Hurrem Sultan (known in the West as Roxselana), wife of Suleyman the Magnificent (ruled 1520-1566) and mother of Selim II

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.

A harem musician wearing a more usual kind of dress than the members of the Valide Pasha's band

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:

Traditional Ottoman clothing worn in a harem. From Sophia Lane-Poole's book "The Englishwoman in Egypt".

“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

A 'cariye' in training; note the traditional high pattens worn by both women

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,

Professional dancer in a harem

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.

An enthusiastic harem orchestra of earlier times

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 Unsurprisingly, 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...

Prayer Boxes

2008-11-29T07:38:00.000-08:00

Prayer Boxes can be used for many different uses. Many people keep them upon their shrines and ask that their own tutelary Goddess Bless the prayers & wishes placed within the box.
The idea is that you write down your desire (or even write down a prayer on behalf of others) and place the wish inside the box.
You may also like to keep reiki symbols to enhance the manifestation process, or draw other meaningful symbols such as goddess spiral or pentagram or whatever else you may feel is appropriate.
You may also care to add crystals, herbs and elaborate the process as much as you want so it becomes more like a spell or you may just prefer to keep it simple,
The choice is personal.

My own small wooden box is one that I found in an occult shop which I like because it’s made from oak and has a silver pentagram inlaid on the lid. It just makes me feel happy to look at it.
I also have a large one that I made from an old recycled wooden toolbox which I painted silver inside and then embellished with silver glitter spirals. The outside is painted in the colours of either the rising/setting sun with a large dragon over the top which I am rather proud of.
I read in a Feng Shui book once never to put any kind of border around Dragons because they like to roam free and have a chance to grow bigger (I think they were talking specifically about Dragon logos on business cards) – anyway, this stayed in my mind so my dragon remains unrestricted J
I now use the Dragon box to keep my candles in & to bless them.

One final object I use is also a pink prayer basket, I found it in a charity shop I love its vibrant pink colour and the shape of it, this one was used more specifically for Reiki healing prayers, I write down the healing required either for a person, animal or situation and put in my pink prayer basket. At the bottom of it I keep Reiki symbols & as I close the lid I ask that the Goddess may assist with the healing process. Then whenever I can I hold the basket and envisage the healing assistance going to the named recipients in the pink basket.
Distance healing can be fun, its nice to be able to focus our intentions like this, I often feel tingling in my hands whilst holding them over the prayer boxes, also amulets, charms or just nice gifts for people may also be placed within to imbue with a special bit of magic.

I hope this inspires you to make a little prayer box of your own, you could even make one from cardboard and decorate with your own designs & embellishments. There are lots of box templates on the internet freely available to printout, you could even recycle old cereal boxes or any bits of old cardboard and transform into a beautiful personal prayer box.

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-11-25T08:04:00.001-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Jack-in-the-Green and other entertainments
After ten days staying at the hotel, the educational staff were able to return to Choubrah. However, Ellen somewhat regretted this, as she was no longer able to see the kind of sights that – presumably – she had gone to work abroad for.

“My windows faced the east. I saw the sun rise every morning over the Mokattam Hills, and in the evening I went up to the promenade on the roof to see it set. It is impossible to imagine a more animated scene than upon which we looked down.

"Every morning Arab weddings passed, with a long file of carriages, in the last of which the bride was seated, with large shawls or carpets thrown across the windows to conceal her from the public gaze. Let us hope she can see, though she cannot be seen!

A 19th century Arab wedding - the bride is sitting on the camel, concealed by carpets.

"In the poorer weddings there are no carriages. All the party walk, accompanied by the clang of instruments, and the bride is in a sort of Jack-in-the-green, which screens her from the public gaze; but there is such a throng about her, and so much dust, that I think she must be stifled!”

An 18th - early 19th century "Jack-in-the-Green" in a Maytime celebration in London - doubtless a scene that Ellen remembered from childhood. Compare the appearance of the "Jack" to the bride in the picture above.

(A “Jack-in-the-green” is a traditional character in English Maytime celebrations, and is no doubt very ancient in origin, representing the annual re-growth of plants and crops. A person wears a conical or pyramid-shaped framework, covered in foliage. Traditional Maytime celebrations declined during the 19th century, but the Jack-in-the-green was obviously still a familiar character, at least in the 1870s. The revival of English folk-song and dance since the early 20th century has led to the character re-appearing, usually as part of a Morris-Dance).

Still, there was one festival that Ellen could experience – Ramadan. However, she was uneasy: “We had seen the effect of this formidable fast the year before, and by no means looked forward to it.”

Indeed, Princess Zeynab fell ill with a severe sore throat (although of course being ill, she was permitted to avoid, or postpone, her fast). She suffered a great deal from such sore throats, and indeed, her terminal illness began with one. Ellen found Princess Zeynab in bed, ill, “suffering from the throat, an indisposition to which she was very liable. Of course she could do no lessons, and at first she seemed unwilling that Kopsès should do any, saying that Kopsès would get on before her; but I counted nine persons around her bed, and said surely she did not want ten, so she gave up with her usual sweetness of temper, and Kopsès came with me.”

What was this disease? Certainly it recurred during Zeynab’s life, Ellen saying that “she had been subject to this illness from early childhood.” It involved “an enlargement of the uvula, which would sometimes swell so much as to touch the larynx and nearly choke her.” Fortunately most attacks seemed to have been of short duration, as Ellen was to describe playing duets (presumably on a piano) with her only a “day or two after.” One guess would be tonsillitis; this certainly appears to have been the diagnosis at the time, as a tonsillectomy was suggested, using a new method of surgery, which, however, the Princess unfortunately declined to have.

Indeed, the Princess’s last illness started with a severe sore throat, which might perhaps raise the possibility that her death at least partly resulted in septicaemia, from abscesses developing on her tonsils, although her death was diagnosed at the time as being the result of typhoid.

Ellen found that teaching in the harem was not easy. “We were constantly interrupted in our lessons by the slaves, who came in without scruple, sometimes talked either to my pupils or among themselves, and finally, finding themselves unnoticed, went away again, generally leaving all the doors open. As a rule all doors are left open; my shutting them was an innovation.”

The reason for this was because: “Every Princess has a great many attendants attached to her person, whose business it is to amuse her, and to anticipate her every want. To leave her alone would be considered a shocking neglect. …No place is sacred from their intrusion; they cannot understand any one wishing to be alone and undisturbed. My pupils knew this well, so they never rebuked them.”

Sometimes, however, the visitor was considerably more important. Whilst Ellen was teaching Kopsès during Princess Zeynab’s illness: “the door opened again for the seventh or eighth time, and looking around, I saw a gentleman standing in the doorway. I forgot for the moment that I was in an harem, and my near sight prevented me from distinguishing who it was.” In fact, it was Ismail himself. (Ellen was, unfortunately, very short-sighted). Ellen was disappointed that Princess Zeynab was not there, “as I should have been so glad for him [Ismail] to have seen the progress she had made.”

No sooner had Ismail left, than the Second Princess came in. “She asked me in Turkish how I was, and I was able to reply to that question, but could not remember one of the polite speeches which I had been getting up.”

One of the nice things about Ellen is that she never minded revealing her own small failings and weaknesses. After all, Recollections of an Egyptian Princess is partly autobiography (or, more accurately, a memoir). Indeed, Ellen herself appears in it far more than Princess Zeynab does. Yet Ellen is never quite her own heroine. She never glorifies, or tries to justify herself, and is always ready to reveal her own small, human failings, of health, or spirits, or – as now - of forgetfulness.

About a month after returning to Cairo, Zeynab moved into the Abdeen Palace from the house next door.

Entrance to the Abdeen Palace, early 20th century

Ellen didn’t like the Abdeen Palace. “The entrance was a most disagreeable one at that time, You first had to pass through an outer court, in which were soldiers, grooms, carriages, carts, &c., &c.; then into a second full of eunuchs. Here you left the carriage; but there were several doors, and you did not know which to take to enter the harem.” The Palace, indeed, was a maze. First she asked some unhelpful eunuchs, who eventually directed her to a door behind which was a “labyrinth of passages”. Here, she “met several girls, but they did not appear to understand my enquiries, or at any rate did not answer them. At last I emerged upon an inner court, and after crossing that, found myself in some of the best apartments. Here my enquiries were more successful, and I was presently led to her apartments.”

She had, in fact, entered the Palace from the rear. But entering from the front was not an option; “if I went to the chief gate, I might constantly find myself much delayed by the absence of the head eunuchs, and by the gate being locked.”

Ramadan ended on 1 December in 1872, and as the year before, Ellen went to pay her respects to the Princesses. This year, however, she took three (female) English friends with her, “as travellers are always very desirous of being present at these festivals.”

Unhappily, it all fell rather flat, although on this occasion Ellen had an interpreter, a (presumably) French lady, referred to only as “Mademoiselle O”, who “resided in the harem with his Highness’s second daughter."
Princess Fatima Ismail

(Ismail's second daughter was in fact Princess Fatima Ismail (1853-1920), a pioneer of women's education in Egypt, who sold her jewellery and six feddans (acres) of her own land in Cairo, as well as the income from a further 658 feddans, to help pay for what is now Cairo University).

Usually, such visits would be filled with polite enquiries about families, then in drinking coffee and smoking pipes. But of course European ladies didn’t smoke pipes. Furthermore, the Princesses had “become aware that is not the custom in Europe for the lady of the house to ask her visitors whether they are married or single; if the later why they remain so, and if the former, how many children they have.” What was worse still “we had not even the resource of the weather, an unfailing topic of interest in England. It is always fine in Egypt; and we could not touch on any of the topics of the day, because the ladies of the harem neither read the newspapers nor mixed in society.”

Fortunately, after a while “more visitors arrived, and we came away”, no doubt to every one’s relief.

It did, however, get better. The day afterwards, Ellen visited Indji Hanem Effendi, who was generally known as the Princess Saïd to Europeans. Princess Indji “has been known for many years among Europeans, for her kind and courteous manners towards them.” What was more, “she had adopted in her palace many European improvements which conduce to sanitary reform”. In a hot climate, that was only too important; it is perhaps not impossible that Princess Zeynab’s illnesses and death could have resulted from inadequate sanitation.

Better still, “The Princess Saïd had a regular entertainment for us. She knew that European visitors wanted to see the amusements of harem life, and she always gratified this wish. So after the pipes and coffee, a few slaves came in with musical instruments… then five girls came in, and danced for about a quarter of an hour. They were in pale pink dresses, in the Turkish fashion – that is to say, loose, confined at the waist by a band, high up to the throat, and the skirt forming trousers, which, however, are not easily detected, as they are exceedingly full… this dress is so remarkably decent, that, although the dances usually end with a somersault, there is no further display than the soles of the feet!”

This does not seem to have been a belly-dance, but a traditional kind of dance similar to Ancient Egyptian ones. This 19th century picture shows what Ellen would have seen - right down to the traditional long-stemmed pipe (seen leaning against the table) and cup of coffee that was offered to guests.

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-11-21T09:26:00.000-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Back in Cairo

By October 1872, Ellen was: “constantly expecting the order for our return. At last it came, and we were told we were to go on board the Masr [in fact the ship's name was el-Misr, “Egypt”], one of the steam-yachts belonging to his Highness, which was moored in front of the palace. Our pupils were to return on the Mahroussah with the Second Princess.”

The el-Misr had taken part in the opening celebrations for the Suez Canal in 1869, when it had carried, amongst others, Sir Frederick Arrow, the Deputy Master of Trinity House. (Trinity House is the organisation responsible for lighthouses, and other navigational aids, in England and Wales). Sir Frederick described the ship as being “a large, powerful screw vessel, fitted up as a passenger vessel, but loaded with gilding and beautiful wood carving, her occupation being, about once a year, to take the Viceroy’s entourage for a sniff of the briny.”

Sir Frederick, a former Master Mariner, would not have approved of the running of the ship when Ellen voyaged on board it. “We, the educational staff, and Mrs. Freeland and her children, went on board the Masr on the morning of the 14th, [October] and were much annoyed to find that one of the cabins which we had taken had been appropriated to some one else… there was no one to regulate and arrange as on European ships.” What was more: “The hot deck was very crowded and dirty. I wonder what an English sailor would say to their mode of washing it! They throw down a quantity of water, and then drag along a piece of flannel to wipe it up!”

Still, apart from this, Ellen was generally pleased with the ship. “We went to look at the accommodation on the Masr, and were very well satisfied with it… the Masr had also splendid harem apartments; but there were many excellent cabins all over the ship … The windows in the cabins were large, so I hoped to see something of the land we might pass, while dressing in the morning.”

A fellow passenger had an interesting story, recounted by Ellen. Some years previously, a wealthy woman had wanted to make the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca. However, she could only do this as a married woman. Ellen takes up the story: “Strange as it may appear, I was told that temporary marriages are often made by rich women for that purpose. So the lady in question married a poor man, and after the pilgrimage was accomplished she departed from her temporary husband, making him a handsome present in return for his protection.”

However, protection was not all that she got from him. “A daughter was, however the result of the connection, who was brought up by her mother and received a good education. In the meantime, the repudiated husband went to Egypt, entered the service of the Viceroy, and rose to rank and dignity. The father, now become a great man, conceived a wish to see his daughter, who was married and had one or more children. So the lady was in the same vessel with us, in the part devoted to the harem, on her way to Egypt to visit the father whom she had never yet beheld.”

Who says that stories never have happy endings!

But it was not to be so happy for Princess Zeynab, who would be confined to the harem on her return to Egypt. “My dear little pupil was now “shut up.””, Ellen wrote. “Her last day of liberty had bee that on which she left Emirghian. Henceforward I was now to go to her daily to give lessons in the harem.” Kopsès was also to live in the harem, with Zeynab; of course as a slave she had even less choice about it than Zeynab did. Both seem to have merely accepted it as inevitable; on her first visit to the harem to give them lessens, Ellen found they: “were very quiet, and said nothing whatever of the change that had taken place in their condition since I last saw them.”

Ellen, however, felt deeply for them. “It really went to my heart to see them thus caged”, she wrote, “because they had known what liberty was, and lost it just at the age when its deprivation would have been felt the most.” (Princess Zeynab was now aged 14, and Kopsès perhaps slightly older; evidently they had entered the harem at puberty).

Princess Zeynab, perhaps not long before she entered the harem. However her short (by the standards of the time) French style skirt indicates that she had not yet, however, quite reached puberty when this photo was taken.

William Loring, indeed, wrote that Princess Zeynab "rebelled when the time came for her incarceration, and that she lamented in tears her unfortunate fate." This may well be true, although Ellen (perhaps diplomatically) does not mention it.

Still, like so much else, neither Zeynab or even it seems Ismail himself, could have done anything about it, as Ellen explained:

“The Khédive did all that lay in his power to give his daughter careful and moral training in early youth, but he could not set aside the opinion of all Mahometans [sic], which would have been outraged by her retaining that liberty when arrived at womanhood.”

And Ismail could not have afforded that. He was already unpopular for favouring foreigners with the strong nationalist movement that was developing in Egypt during the 1870s; this was, after all, a mere seven years before the start of the Urabi Revolt against Ismail and the undue influence of foreigners – specifically Europeans, Turko-Circassians and Albanians.

Indeed, the two women closest to Princess Zeynab at this time, apart from her mother, the Second Princess, were two such: Ellen, a European, and Kopsès, who appears to have been Circassian. Ismail might have felt it best not to publicise this fact too much, as it certainly risked being commented on unfavourably by the popular, and increasingly nationalist Egyptian press of the time.

What was more, Ismail seems to have hoped that his daughter would carry forwards his plans for the increasing westernisation of Egypt. And that would require tact; according to Ellen the plan seems to have involved “marrying her early, and then encouraging her gradually and innocently to introduce European customs”.

It all inevitably lead to the question, did Ellen, however innocently and indirectly, have any kind of political role? Or to put it more simply, whose side was she on? After all, it would perhaps be naïve not to imagine that she was completely outside the political sphere, as one of the main influences on a member of the Egyptian Royal Family. And she certainly had associations, at least, with British Establishment circles.

The answer seems to have been that, if anything, she was loyal to the Khedival family, even delaying publishing her book – despite her need to earn money – until its appearance could not offend, or harm any of them. And indeed, it seems to have been her intention to remain in Egypt, even when her employment there had ended, as she wrote that she left it “with deep regret”, and felt that it had “an attraction surpassing that of all other countries.” (Including, evidently, Britain).

She does not say, indeed, why she had to return. All that we do know is that she went to live with her older sister, Anne Lydia, in Cheltenham, so it may be possible that it was to care for Anne Lydia, who may possibly have been in poor health, as she was not to live for many more years.

Ellen did not immediately return to the house in Choubrah on her return to Cairo, as it was needed for part of the retinue of Grand Duke Nicholas of Russia (whether the elder or the younger of that name is not specified), visiting Egypt after having visited Constantinople. For Ellen, this simply meant having to live in an hotel for a while. But it would seem likely that the Grand Duke’s visit concerned the tensions that were increasingly building up in the Ottoman Empire, particularly in the Balkans, and which were to lead to the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878, and the increased intervention of European powers in the region.

In the past, Princess Zeynab and Kopsès had travelled to Choubrah for their lessons. Now Ellen had to travel to the palaces to teach them. Ellen only regretted that the two young women were thereby deprived of a daily ride outside.

The Khedive, and his family had returned from Constantinople to the Abdeen palace, which, according to Ellen, they used as their winter palace.

Entrance Hall of the Abdeen Palace, early 20th century

The Palace was, at that time, still under construction. Building had started in 1863, and was to continue until 1874; evidently, however, by late 1872 enough of it was complete for the Khedival family to move in. Following Ismail’s taste for Parisian style architecture, it had been designed by a French architect.

Ellen gives a description of the Khedival family’s life at Abdeen, which has a certain rarity value, as in fact the Khedival family were to spend very little time there in the future, with the Palace being mainly used as government offices.

Construction work meant that, at first, Princess Zeynab and Kopsès did not live in the Palace itself, but in an adjoining house, belonging to the then Minister of Finance, Ismael Sadyk Pasha. Sadyk, Ellen explains, was at that time: “in high favour, but a few years after disgraced and exiled to Dongola.”

“The time of my coming and going”, Ellen wrote “was to be fixed by myself, and the [Princess’s] Turkish and Arabic lessons were to be arranged accordingly.” However, she rather ominously went on to mention that “the Princess no longer rose so early as she had been accustomed to do when she came to us.” In other words, Princess Zeynab, like all other teenagers, had a tendency to sleep in!

The Princess had previously been awoken in time to go for her lessons by her attendants, “who would be blamed if she was late… But all this changed in the harem, as I soon had occasion to see. Perhaps the Princess might have sat up late at night, and as a growing girl she required much sleep. In the morning the rooms were all darkened, and not a sound was to be heard until the Princess became wide awake of her own accord, and called out to her slaves to come and dress her.”

This was only the start of a sort of comedy of every one not arriving on time.

On the first morning of lessons at the harem, a carriage came to the hotel for Ellen at seven o’clock in the morning. Ellen had not yet even breakfasted, so she arranged for the carriage to come again at nine, which it did. Ellen then (somewhat optimistically, as it turned out) arranged the times when she would come, and leave in future, with Princess Zeynab.

“After consultation,” Ellen wrote, “I settled that I would come every morning at half-past eight, and leave at twelve”. (The Princess had Arabic and Turkish lessons in the afternoon). “…the carriage was ordered to fetch me from the hotel at that hour.”

19th. century Egyptian carriage driver

But: “the next morning at ten no carriage had arrived so I sent… to ask the reason. …On enquiring why it was so late, I was told it was because I had objected to it going so early the day before! …When I arrived at the palace, I found that the Princess had been waiting for me for more than an hour. I was much vexed, and requested that positive [i.e. firm] directions should be given to fetch me every morning at the time named.”

The following morning, the carriage came for Ellen again at seven o’clock. “I swallowed a hasty breakfast and went to the harem, where I found the Princess not dressed and amazed at my having come so early. The eunuch had simply told the coachman that he was to go earlier, so he thought he would come in time!”

Princess Zeynab herself awoke at varying times. “From the time of her seclusion in the harem, she always took breakfast, luncheon, and dinner with his Highness [i.e. Ismail], but the time for the first meal was not very regular. His Highness transacted much business before breakfast, so that it might be late. Someone was on the watch to give notice when he was coming, and then if the Princess was sleeping, her attendants did not hesitate to awaken her, and hurry through the toilet.” A late breakfast would affect the time when Ellen was able to start lessons.

Things did not improve much. “The same unpunctuality with the carriage went on in spite of the repeated orders of the Princess. It sometimes came an hour before time, and sometimes an hour after. There was always the same difficulty in getting away.” That is, a carriage was never available to taker her back.

However, by chance, whilst Ellen waiting for a carriage home one afternoon, Ismail walked past. Princess Zeynab seized the opportunity, and “drew me gently into an apartment just at the entrance [of the harem], whilst she herself waited the coming of her father. As the Khédive passed the room in which I was, he caught sight of the European dress, and I heard him ask his daughter who it was.
“It is my governess, who is waiting for the carriage to take her away.”
“And why don’t you order it?” said his Highness.
“I have done so, but they do not come.”
“What! not obey my daughter!” said the Khédive.
He walked quickly towards the door, and called loudly that a carriage was to come up immediately…”

Still, by now Ellen had had enough of this, and so wrote a letter of complaint to the Second Princess. And sure enough, “The next morning, at eight o’clock, I was surprised to see a pretty open carriage at the door… the Khédive had given orders that a carriage wshould be sent for me every morning at eight, and that it was to bring me back at twelve; that I was at liberty to order it whenever I wished for a drive in the afternoon, or go to the opera, or French theatre in the evening.”

However:

“For the first week or two I had a very nice carriage, then an inferior one was substituted, and I was told it was solely to take me to and from the harem daily…”

Ellen more-or-less gave up. “I believe the Khédive wishes to act fairly and liberally” she wrote, “but there is such a jealousy existing, first, between natives and foreigners, and secondly, between the different nationalities, that the officials manage constantly to evade the Khédive’s orders; and though you may sometimes succeed in making your complaint reach his ears, so as to obtain temporary redress, the tables are sure to be turned on you in the end.”

For Ellen, this jealousy between natives and foreigners and between different nationalities was a mere inconvenience. For Egypt itself, it was soon, unfortunately, to have tragic and far-reaching consequences.

To be continued

Charges of The Goddess.

2008-11-20T09:11:00.000-08:00

The Charges of the Goddess

The Charge of the Goddess is a beautiful poetic affirmation that I like to recall every full moon as do many other Goddess devotee’s.The original version which follows by Doreen Valiente was purported to have been found in a Gardenerian book of shadows and adapted by renowned Priestess Doreen.

Many people prefer to adapt these words into something more personal which resonates with their own belief system. The Charge of the Goddess is a powerful spell which reminds us to honour the divine feminine & also affirm that we can focus on our own goals at this time.

I particularly like the paragraph by Starhawk which states:

“And you who seek to know me, know that the seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery: for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without.”

It’s very easy to believe that we need something external to make us happy & that we can not enjoy life without acquiring the love of some particular person or some magical item or even a boob job!I think that she is telling us to trust in ourselves and the love of the Goddess.

The following are the most popular versions but you may find some others of your own or even prefer to write/adapt one to honour the Goddess at the time of the Full Moon.

By Doreen Valiente

Listen to the words of the Great Mother; she who of old was also called among men Artemis, Astarte, Athene, Dione, Melusine, Aphrodite, Cerridwen, Cybele, Arianrhod, Isis, Dana, Bride, and by many other names:

Whenever ye have need of anything, once in the month, and better it be when the moon is full, then shall ye assemble in some secret place and adore the spirit of me, who am Queen of all the witches.There shall ye assemble, ye who are fain to learn all sorcery, yet have not won its deepest secrets; to these will I teach things that are yet unknown.

And ye shall be free from slavery; and as a sign that ye be really free, ye shall be naked in your rites; and ye shall dance, sing, feast, and make music and love, all in my praise.

For mine is the ecstasy of the spirit and mine also is joy on earth; for my law is love unto all beings.

Keep pure your highest ideal; strive ever towards it; let naught stop you or turn you aside.

For mine is the secret door which opens upon the Land of Youth, and mine is the cup of the wine of life, and the Cauldron of Cerridwen, which is the Holy Grail of immortality.

I am the Gracious Goddess, who gives the gift of joy unto the heart of man.Upon earth, I give the knowledge of the spirit eternal; and beyond death, I give peace and freedom and reunion with those who have gone before.

Nor do I demand aught in sacrifice; for behold, I am the Mother of all living, and my love is poured out upon the earth.

Hear ye the words of the Star Goddess; she in the dust of whose feet are the hosts of heaven, and whose body encircles the Universe.

I who am the beauty of the green earth, and the white Moon among the stars, and the mystery of the waters, and the desire of the heart of man, call unto thy soul. Arise, and come unto me.

For I am the soul of nature, who gives life to the universe. From me all things proceed, and unto me all things must return; and before my face, beloved of Gods and of men, let thine innermost divine self be enfolded in the rapture of the infinite.

Let my worship be within the heart that rejoiceth; for behold, all acts of love and pleasure are my rituals. And therefore let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honour and humility, mirth and reverence within you

.And thou who thinkest to seek for me, know thy seeking and yearning shall avail thee not unless thou knowest the mystery;that if that which thou seekest thee findest not within thee, thou wilt never find it without thee. For behold, I have been with thee from the beginning; and I am that which is attained at the end of desire.

By Starhawk.

Listen to the words of the Great Mother, who of old was calledArtemis, Astarte, Dione, Melusine, Aphrodite,Cerridwen, Diana, Arionrhod, Brigid, and by many other names:

Whenever you have need of anything, once a month, and better it be when the moon is full, you shall assemble in some secret place and adore the spirit of Me Who is Queen of all the Wise.

You shall be free from slavery, and as a sign that you be free you shall be naked in your rites.

Sing, feast, dance, make music and love, all in my presence, for mine is the ecstasy of the spirit and mine also is joy on Earth.

For My law is love unto all things. Mine is the secret that opens the door of youth, and mine is the cup of wine of life that is the Cauldron of Cerridwen, that is the holy grail of immortality.

I give the knowledge of the spirit eternal, and beyond death I give peace and freedom and reunion with those that have gone before.

Nor do I demand aught of sacrifice, for behold, I am the Mother of all things and my love is poured out upon the Earth.

Hear the words of the Star Goddess, the dust of whose feet are the hosts of Heaven, Whose body encircles the universe. I who am the beauty of the green earth and the white moon among the stars and the mysteries of the waters, I call upon your soul to arise and come unto me.

For I am the soul of nature that gives life to the universe. From me all things proceed and unto Me they must return.Let my worship be in the heart that rejoices, for behold, all acts of love and pleasure are my rituals.

Let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honour and humility, mirth and reverence within you.

And you, who seek to know me, know that the seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery:

for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without.For behold, I have been with you from the beginning, and I am that which is attained at the end of desire.

by Stewart Farrar

There shall ye assemble, ye who are fain to learn all sorcery, yet have not won its deeper secrets; to these will I teach all things that are as yet unknown, And ye shall be free from slavery;

and as a sign ye be truly free, you shall be naked in your rites, and ye shall dance, sing and feast, make music and love, all in my praise.

For mine is the ecstasy of the spirit, and more and mine is also Joy on Earth; for my law is love unto all beings.

Keep pure your highest ideals; strive ever towards them, let nothing stop you or turn you aside. For mine is the secret door which opens upon the Land of Youth, and mine is the cup of the of the wine of life, and the Cauldron of Cerridwen, which is the Holy Vessel of Immortality.

I am the Gracious Goddess, who gives the gift of joy unto the heart of man. Upon Earth, I give the knowledge of the spirit eternal; and beyond death, I give peace and freedom, and reunion with those who have gone before.

Nor do I demand sacrifice for behold, I am the Mother of all living, and my love is poured out onto the Earth.

I am the beauty of green earth, and the white moon among the stars, and the mystery of the waters, and the desire of the heart of man.

Call unto thy soul, arise, and come unto me.For I am the soul of nature. Who gives life to the universe.

From me all things proceed, and unto me all things must return; and before my face, beloved of Gods and men, let thine innermost divine self be enfolded in the rapture of the infinite.

Let my worship be within the heart that rejoiceth; for behold all acts of love and pleasure are my rituals.

Therefore, let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honour and humility, mirth and reverence within you.

And thou who thinketh to seek for me, know thy seeking and yearning shall avail thee not unless thou knoweth the mystery; that if that which thy seekest thou findest not within thee, thou wilt never it without thee.

For behold, I have been with thee from the beginning; and I am that which is attained at the end of desire. So says the Goddess...

by Silver RavenWolf

Hear my words and know me! I shall be called a million names by all who speak!

I am Eternal Maiden! I am Great Mother! I am the Old One who holds the immortal key!

I am shrouded in Mystery, but am known to every soul.

Hear my words and know me!

Whenever the moon rises in the Heavens shall my children come to me.

Better it be once a month when the moon is full, shall ye assemble in some secret place, such as this, and adore the spirit of I.

I, who am the Queen of Witches! And under my watchful eye, my children shall be taught the mysteries of Earth and Nature, of the ways of all Magick!

That which is unknown shall be known, and that which is hidden shall be revealed, even the secluded soul shall be pierced with my Light.

From my cauldron shall be drunk all knowledge and immortality! Ye shall be free from slavery and ye shall dance, sing, and feast.

Music shall surround you, for mine is the ecstasy of the spirit, and mine is also the joy of the earth!

I do not demand sacrifice! For behold, I am the Mother of all living things!

Create and heal! Be strong, yet gentle. Be noble, yet reverent.

Bring forth and replenish. And, as does the cycle of the Moon ever begin to wax and wane and to grow forth again, as do the seasons from one to the next flow in smooth rhythm, from sowing to reaping, to seeming death and rebirth.....So will my children know their own pattern in both worlds!

And ye shall say these words...I will love and harm none.

I Will live, love, die, and live again. I will meet, remember, and know. And embrace once more

.For the free will of ALL, and with harm to None As I will it now is done So mote it be!

by Charles G. Leland - Aradia

Whenever you have need of anything, one in the month and be it better when the moon is full, then shall you assemble in some secret place and adore the spirit of me, who am the Queen of all witches.

When I have departed from this world, Whenever you have need of anything, Once a month, and when the moon is full, Ye shall assemble in some desert place or in a forest all together join to adore the potent spirit of your Queen My mother, great Diana, She who fain Would learn all sorcery yet has not won Its deepest secrets, then my mother will Teach her, in truth all things as yet unknown.

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-11-18T09:39:00.000-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Bad food and wonderful excursions
The Lonely Planet guide says that: “Istanbul is hot. And we’re not talking about the weather.” Ellen would have agreed wholeheartedly – that’s plain from her book. And in an age when few people still travelled far beyond their native town or village, to arrive at the “City of the World’s Desire”, on board a royal yacht must have been like a fairy-tale come true. It would be for anyone.

Constantinople (Istanbul) in the 19th century

“Perhaps there is no place in the world more striking to a stranger than that which presents itself on the first arrival at the bridge [sic] at Constantinople” she wrote, after arriving on the ferry from Emirgan. (“Bridge” was an old-fashioned term for a pier). "The great variety of costume worn by the passers-by… the city of Stamboul to the left, with all its mosques and minarets rising one above the other, and the glorious view which presents itself on every side, - all make a panorama of unequalled beauty and interest.” This is still true (apart from the “variety of costume”). And now, as then, the ferry is still one of the best ways to see the city.

Emirgan from the Bosphorus in the 19th century. The hillside, now a park, is where the palace buildings and Ellen's lodgings were situated.

Still, the Constantinople of the 1870s was not entirely the same city as the Istanbul of today. For example one of Ellen's first excursions was to Pera, still a popular spot to get a view over the city. But she was to find that: “in the steep ways which lead up to Pera is no pathway… horses are led or ridden up and down, and it is your business to get out of their way, not theirs to avoid you… the way is paved with sharp pebbles, with occasional hollows full of mud and water… then there are the hamals (or porters) always ascending or descending with some dreadful burden on their backs, sufficient to weigh down an ox. These men are bent down, and of course see nothing: as with the horses, you must get out of their way… Last of all, there are the dogs, which lie stretched across the streets, and never move for any one, unless it is to join in a body to hunt off some canine intruder that has ventured to trespass on their territory.”

Yet Ellen was always the same, indefatigable Ellen, and she concludes with almost a wink that: “I made up my mind after one visit to Galata and Pera that nothing but sheer necessity should send me there again; but then some necessity was always arising.”

A road in 19th century Constantinople like the one Ellen desribed. The view is indeed worth the climb!

There was to be another somewhat unpleasant experience, when Ellen, together with Mr. and Mrs. Freeland, paid a visit to the Mosque of Haga Sophia, with their dragoman (interpreter) Shaheen. It was a Friday, the Islamic holy day, and there were of course many worshippers in the Mosque. Still, all went well at first: “We were walking slowly round, no one interfering with us or noticing us”. But then (somewhat surprisingly for someone who was, presumably, a Moslem): “our dragoman, anxious to show us everything, led us across the mosque, past many groups of worshippers.” The result was only to be expected. “Soon there were angry countenances, several persons rose and surrounded our dragoman, and insisted upon our going out. Poor Shaheen resisted, and brought forward his talisman of “Highness’s people!” but it was of no use here; he was in the hands of several fierce-looking Turks, who were, I must say, very fine-looking stalwart men."

Haga Sophia in the 1870s, as Ellen would have seen it

Shaheen seems to have thought that the worshippers could actually have been bought off, although Ellen knew better: “Our dragoman was of the opinion that a few francs would have soothed matters and enabled us to remain, but I think he was mistaken, and that we were in the wrong in crossing the mosque among the worshippers; had we kept to the outer circle we should have seen as well, and not interfered with those who were performing their devotions.”

Still, as with Pera, it was to be only the first of many visits to the Mosque.

The Second Princess, a very thoughtful and kind lady, allowed Ellen to use a local type of rowing-boat called a caïque, belonging to the Court, to help her explore the city. Unfortunately, its use was not entirely free of charge: “as backsheesh is an institution in the East, I soon found that unless I gave the rowers about the same amount as a public boat would have cost, the caïque was not forthcoming when ordered. However, it was a better boat [than the public ones], and then there was the honour of the thing!”

Caiques at Constantinople in the 19th century

You feel that not much could have spoilt Constantinople for Ellen. But one thing nearly did. And this was Mustapha the cook. “The name of Mustapha had been a bugbear to us for a long time, and for this reason: he had officiated as cook to our predecessors (General Maclean and his family): … the complaints regarding him had been so many and so frequent that when we arrived it was decided a different plan should be adopted; a certain sum was to be provided monthly, and we were to employ our own cook.”

Unfortunately, however, they did not take their own cook with them to Constantinople. And: “we found to our dismay that Mustapha was to be our cook. I don’t know whether he was brought from Egypt for that purpose, but I should think it was more likely that he managed to secure himself a passage on one of the Viceroy’s steamers, having previously ascertained that we had no cook with us, and then turned up just as one was enquired for.”

Ellen made it clear just why the complaints about Mustapha were justified. “I must describe a little his way of cooking, to account for our repugnance. The meat was cut up into square blocks, quite irrespective of joints; it was well soaked in water, and then cooked. Thus there would be many pieces of meat on the table, very sodden and tasteless; vegetables floating in water, and various sweet dishes which custom only can make palatable. This was at luncheon, when the Pasha and the Princess [i.e. Zeynab and Ibrahim] were present; at dinner, in the evening, it was worse.”

Furthermore, a small house was built for Mustapha not far from Ellen’s room. For privacy, therefore, she had to keep the blinds on the windows facing it drawn. But unfortunately trees blocked the view from her other windows. It was not often that Ellen complained, but on this occasion she let rip, and “complained most loudly; and my pupil [i.e. Princess Zeynab], instigated by me, spoke to her mother [the Second Princess] on the subject.” Again, the Second Princess showed her consideration, and ordered the trees to be cut back, allowing Ellen a view. Her complaints were certainly justified; the view from the park at Emirgan (where the palace buildings were) is indeed not something anyone would want to be forced to miss.

It was not to be the last difficulty Ellen had with the cooking arrangements. Later on, indeed, she was left without anyone at all to cook for her, and almost had nothing to eat.

But despite the inconveniences Ellen was determined to make the most of being in Constantinople, and described excursion after excursion that she made. In all, it gives us a fascinating picture of a city and way of life that was on the edge of far-reaching change, and is especially valuable for that alone.

The Bosphorus at Constantinople in the 1870s, as Ellen would have seen it, showing caiques and a (very smoky) ferry; this was part of the view that Ellen was so disappointed not to have seen from the Mahroussa.

Ellen describes steamers like the one in this picture. "Volumes of black smoke arose as made the atmosphere suddenly appear rather like that of Newcastle or Wolverhampton [industrial cities in Britain] than the shores of the Bosphorus. It was like a thick fog, and was I think occasioned partly... by the very inferior quality of the coal used in them."

Princess Zeynab also seems to have largely enjoyed the visit. She was a lively and active young woman, and, like Ellen, made the most of her trips out. For example, on a picnic in the Forest of Belgrade, Ellen described how “The Princess and I, with two or three others, started at once for a walk. She was as much inclined for active exercise as an English girl would have been, and was never so happy as when making one of these excursions.”

Ellen pointed out with foreboding that it was soon to end, however. “This was to be her last summer of liberty [before going to live in the harem]. What misgivings she might have had regarding her future I cannot tell; as we never spoke of her approaching seclusion.”

None the less Ellen was certainly to learn of Zeynab’s misgivings, as later on she wrote that Zeynab would: “speak of her past life of liberty much as an elderly lady might do of her youth; but of one thing was very certain, that she dreaded the life of retirement that lay before her.”

Indeed, another westerner employed at the Khedival Court realised that Zeynab would take her enforced seclusion hard.

This was William Loring, one of the many American soldiers who, following the American Civil War, were employed to help modernise the Egyptian army. In his book, A Confederate soldier in Egypt, published around 1884, Loring wrote that:

William Loring in his Egyptian army uniform

“While the more mature princesses were caged behind lace, his [i.e. Ismail’s] sweet and pretty daughter of thirteen, Zaneeb [sic], for several years took her seat in a box [at the opera] with her young brother unveiled… It was afterward when another year was added to her young life that, much against her will, the traditional veil was forced upon her, and she, too, sat at the opera behind lace curtains [in fact, decorative wire screens], and with others of her sex was compelled to undergo the seclusion of the harem.”

The situation as regards slavery in Egypt was, at this period, somewhat confused. Ismail had promised to end slavery during his lifetime, and indeed had engaged British officials to try to suppress the slave-trade in both Egypt and the Sudan (the best-known of these being General Gordon, who was killed at Khartoum). However, claims that slavery, and slave-trading was still in existence at the time of the British invasion in 1882, are borne out by Ellen:

“The Second Princess had bought a few slave children [presumably whilst in Constantinople] whom she was very anxious to have educated. She sent them up to the school with the Princess, to share in her lessons as she said; but I discouraged their coming, as I wished as much as possible to cultivate the mind of my pupil during the short space of time she would still be under my charge, and the presence of these children much interfered with my plans.”

This may have been a diplomatic excuse on Ellen’s part. She seems to have regarded slavery in much the same way as she was obliged to accept other customs, such as eunuchs and harems. Still, it would certainly have raised certain moral issues for her. We wonder, for instance, what she truly felt about having to educate Kopsès, who was plainly more intelligent than Zeynab, to a lesser level befitting her status as a slave.

Ellen describes one of these slaves, a six year old girl called Behrouse, and for its historical interest this is worth quoting at length:

“I was told her price was £160; but it was quite inexplicable to me how a child could be worth so much [in current terms, using the retail price index, this would be the equivalent of about £10, 240; when compared to average earnings, it would be the equivalent of no less than £83,768], as there was all the trouble of bringing her up, and ultimately of providing for her for life This purchasing of slaves is a very costly way of procuring servants, and I fully believe the Viceroy [i.e. Ismail] would gladly dispense with it; but in the present state of things there is no remedy.”

(Incidentally, it is interesting here that Ellen momentarily forgot to use the past tense in the last paragraph; evidently she quoted directly from her journal).

To follow Ellen’s many excursions in and around Constantinople would take up a great many posts, so full is this part of her book. In October 1872 the Second Princess and her children set off back to Cairo. And so the next post must leave Constantinople as reluctantly as Ellen did, and set sail once again.

Sultanahmet and Haga Sophia in the 1870s; the Constantinople Ellen knew

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-11-13T14:22:00.000-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Sailing to Byzantium

The Khedival royal yacht Mahroussa, on which Ellen travelled from Alexandria to Constantinople in 1872 is, happily, still afloat, and this beautiful old ship is certainly a wonderful sight.

It was built in London, in 1865, to the same design as the British royal yacht, the Victoria and Albert II. Therefore, this picture of the Victoria and Albert II gives a good idea of what the Mahroussa looked like when Ellen sailed on it, with paddle-wheels, tall masts, and two chimneys.

Victoria and Albert II

The Mahroussa remained as the Egyptian royal yacht until 1951, and it was to take the last King, Farouk, into exile. On board it on that occasion was the last of the Royal family’s English governesses, Miss Anne Chermside, who was therefore following her predecessor of 80 years before, in the same ship.

Anne Chermside
By then, the Mahroussa had changed in appearance. Its paddle-wheels had been replaced by a propellor, and one of its chimneys had been removed. It is now used as a naval training-ship, and has been re-named El-Horria.

This picture shows the Mahroussa as it later appeared:

It was – is – an impressive ship, and Ellen was fascinated by it, taking, as ever, the first opportunity to explore. It was divided into three parts; the stern for the Viceroy (or in this case the Harem), the middle for the captain and officers, and the front for the crew and soldiers. It was certainly very elegant inside. “The chief saloon was a magnificent apartment, with seven large windows at the stern, and five on each side, all of course of plate-glass.

Below this saloon was a large state cabin, which was made the sleeping apartment of the Second Princess.” Ellen’s cabin was on the floor below this. It was “excellent in point of size and accommodation, but deficient in only one thing only – air; the windows were high up and not made to open, a most necessary precaution… as they were only a few feet above the water.” As Ellen was soon to find, the cabin had another deficiency – the door did not lock.

It was to be a hurried voyage. Ellen described the Mahroussa as “said to be one of the fastest boats built”, and that “speed was to be our object, and to that all was sacrificed.” The ship travelled at 14 knots per hour (that is, slightly over 16 m.p.h.) “though I believe that is not her greatest speed.” Indeed, it had no less than “four engines, each of 800 horsepower.” On the other hand, such a powerful and fast ship was not always comfortable. “A great drawback to us, however, was that two tremendous chimneys were near the centre of the vessel, so that the deck on which we passed our time lay between them. The heat was intense…”

Zeynab and Kopsès during the voyage “preferred walking about and asking questions concerning everything they saw”, even though a small kiosk had been erected for Zeynab on the deck, which at least allowed Ellen to make frantic notes about what she saw during the voyage. No doubt now she would have been taking dozens of photos instead, for her descriptions are often photographic in detail. She had the ability to sketch with words; we so often see a scene just as she saw it. Obviously she was a skilled writer, with a knowledge of narrative, and how to hold a reader’s attention; so much so, indeed, that it is tempting to wonder if any other of the journal entries she made over the years appeared in print, perhaps in a magazine.

At 9.30 pm., Ellen went to her cabin for the night. But not, unfortunately, to rest for very long. “I looked in vain for a fastening to my door… so I dragged my carpet-bag and a small box before the door to make entry more difficult… I was soon awoke, however, by a light, and by hearing voices close to me, and upon opening my eyes found three or four persons in my cabin.” She shouted at them angrily, and they ran off, laughing. The next morning she found out what had happened. The Second Princess had sent some of her attendants round to see that the lights in each cabin were extinguished (no doubt for risk of fire; they were not, of course, electric lights) and that everything was safe. However, instead of merely looking at the ventilator over the door, to see if any light shone through “curiosity prevailed, and they busied themselves in examining the contents of my cabin, and my toilet arrangements, my own presence asleep adding piquancy to the investigation.” Ellen was not amused.

It was not to be the last upset. The most longed-for part of the voyage was along the Bosporus, past the city of Constantinople, and indeed, anyone who has been lucky to have

Constantinople as Ellen saw it, in the 1870s

seen the view from the water will understand just why Ellen looked forward to it. She went up onto the bridge of the ship to get the best view. But here Zohrab, the doctor “told me (apparently with great concern) that the orders were very strict that no-one could remain on the bridge as we passed Constantinople.” Ellen would not even be allowed to remain in one of the little kiosks erected on the deck. Ellen then went downstairs, into the chief saloon, but even here was to be frustrated. “I was enjoying the beautiful views on both sides, when, just as we were passing St. Sophia, the outer shutters slowly descended, and we were left in darkness! … I must pass the next hour, while going through the loveliest scenery in the world, to which I had looked forward so much, as one who had lost the blessing of sight!” Happily, she was to see it many times in the future.

Ismail’s palace at Emirghian was on the banks of the Bosphorus, and its grounds are now a beautiful park. Three pavilions, which were originally palace buildings can be seen, including the Sarı (Yellow) Pavilion, built by Ismail in the 1870s. Ellen and the rest of the educational staff stayed in a house further up the hillside that had previously been a harem. It was not ideal. It merely “consisted of two storeys, and in this Mr. and Mrs. Freeland, their children, nurses, and myself were to be lodged; an in addition, two schoolrooms must be provided for the Pasha and Princess. It required a great deal of management to arrange…” Not least, because there “We found nothing ready for us – the barest furniture, no table or bed linen, no water laid on or to be got.” Still, the resourceful Ellen, the seasoned traveller, coped, even though she “had hard work to arrange matters for the first two or three days.”

On top of it all, Ellen had lost her luggage. “The eunuchs had been into every cabin [of the ship] and had cleared away their contents… But where were they taken? No one could tell. … The fact is, that on these royal progresses a vast number of people travel together without anyone having the management. … I don’t know how I should ever have got my luggage but for Dick, the Pasha’s English coachman, though of course it was not his business.”

There were, of course, many compensations. Ellen was, at long last, in Constantinople! She had plainly all too obviously longed to go there; on the voyage the Second Princess had joked to her that “she had heard that I did not believe we should ever go to Constantinople, and asked me if I believed it now.” Not surprisingly, when Zeynab did to come for lessons for a few days after arrival, Ellen took the first opportunity to go into the city.

The sixty or so pages of Recollections of an Egyptian Princess that are about the visit to Constantinople are perhaps the most descriptively intense of the whole book. Certainly nothing about the city and its surroundings were wasted on Ellen, who plainly spent some of her happiest days there.

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-11-13T07:53:00.000-08:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

For some time I have left Ellen marooned here, as it were – although I have indeed found out more about her during a visit to England. It is now time that I went on with her story.

What motivated Ellen?

What motivated Ellen, a woman no longer young, to take up what can only have been a somewhat arduous and challenging post in a foreign country? After all, in her late 50s it is likely that she would have been contemplating retirement when Admiral Milne’s daughters no longer needed a governess.

Part of the answer may have been that conditions of employment with the Khedival family, "the service" as she always referred to it as, seem to have been far more generous than in England. For example, when one of the Third Princess’s servants got married, she “received presents from her mistress and the other Princesses, such as might be given to a lady of rank in England… and to crown all, she continued in the service.” (In England a servant would usually lose her job if she got married).

Equally, Ellen undoubtedly gained status from her post as governess to a royal family. She was certainly very proud of having been governess to the Khedival family, to the point of having it mentioned in the announcement of her death in the local Cheltenham newspaper, the "Cheltenham Examiner" on Wednesday 18 November 1896. If nothing else, it would have marked her out as being someone who was different to most governesses.

Still, we might wonder just what her social status was anyway. After all, this would certainly have mattered a great deal to everyone at the time. There are clues that she was from at least well-connected origins; she was employed only by aristocratic families, and was also, on one occasion, asked by Ismail to pay a call on the Earl and Countess of Dudley, then staying in Cairo, who to say the least would not usually feel particularly flattered by a visit from a family’s governess.

There is no doubt that Ellen enjoyed working as a governess; she plainly liked children, and liked teaching. In an age when women had very few careers open to them, it was, for her, a rewarding profession – although of course it was by no means so for all governesses.

Besides, Ellen aimed to do far more than simply teach Zeynab and Kopsès. She had, in fact, an agenda; through Zeynab, she hoped to improve conditions for all Egyptian women.

“I wished”, Ellen wrote, “as much as possible to cultivate the mind of my pupil during the short space of time she would still be under my charge… I told her I thought much would depend on herself. She was in a high position, and would be looked up to as an example. If she by her conduct could show that liberty was not inconsistent with modesty and innocence, there was no doubt but a few years would bring about an entire revolution in the present system with regard to women… in all countries the more civilised [in the Western sense] a state became, the higher did women rise in the social scale.”

Ismail himself would have agreed with this. Indeed, he actually did a great deal himself to improve conditions for women in Egypt, particularly encouraging the setting-up of girls schools. Ellen wrote that he: "was anxious to raise the position of women: he founded schools for girls, he endeavoured to promote education in his own harem..." Indeed, Ellen explains that his ambition for Zeynab was by “encouraging her gradually and innocently to introduce European customs… and had she lived, I believe a thorough change would in a few years have taken place in female society in Egypt”.

Unfortunately of course Zeynab did not live, and “European customs” were unfortunately to be introduced not by persuasion, but by the British invasion and occupation of Egypt. Still, both Ismail and Ellen had done their best.

Ismail has had a very bad press, both at home and abroad, both at the time and ever since. Yet he sincerely tried to modernise Egypt, even if the unfortunate result was to bankrupt the country. Perhaps in the end he was unfortunate in having to face Western imperialism and capitalism at its most ruthless. He saw that the Ottoman Empire, to which Egypt still belonged, was the past, that even then it was the "sick man of Europe", and - for better or worse - that the west represented the future. Ellen recognised his hard work, and his capacity for thoughtfulness towards others, and was loyal to him long after she ceased to be his employee. And yet, she had to recall that, despite his efforts, he all too often was unable to realise his aims.

For instance, she writes that he "gave much greater liberty and means, both of recreation and instruction, to... [his harem's] inmates than any sovereign had done before him." And yet she was to find when she moved into the palace harem with Zeynab and Kopsès that it could still be a dreadfully boring place. “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. I began to doubt whether I was right to sacrifice the few remaining years of health and strength which might be in store for me, to this dreadful monotony of harem life.” (In fact, happily Ellen was to have another 20 years of comparative health and strength afterwards).

But most of all, I think, Ellen accepted the post of governess to the Khedival family for the travel opportunities it gave her. Recollections of an Egyptian Princess is, above all, a travel-book. Its descriptions of contemporary Cairo and Constantinople (now Istanbul) are wonderful; they are detailed, insightful, descriptive and lively. If there was ever a born travel-writer it was plainly Ellen; she must have spent hours making notes.

Ellen was a natural traveller; she was resourceful, plainly quite physically and mentally tough, and valued different cultures. She tried out every experience that she could; whether diving inside a Pyramid in her crinoline, or being rowed in a tiny boat across the Bosphorus. At every possible opportunity she went on an “exploring expedition”.

I wonder, was it her love of travel that led to the somewhat enigmatic epitaph on her tombstone: In my father's house there are many mansions to go to. It is a curious adaptation of a biblical passage that she must have known well. Is it taking speculation too far to read into to go to her wish to see many places, many more "mansions"?

She spoke at least three languages fluently: English, French, and Italian. Very likely as a governess of the time she would also have had at least some familiarity with German. She also tried to learn as much Turkish (the official language of the Khedival Court) as she could, describing how she would “sit about in the saloons with my Turkish books… or at work, sometimes listening to what passed around me, and trying to understand it.

Still, she did not find it easy to learn Turkish, explaining that “a person who understands two or three European languages finds the acquisition of a fourth comparatively easy, but they do not help the least in learning an oriental language.” Other Europeans seem to have had the same difficulty. “I never met" she wrote, "with more than two or three persons who could read and write Arabic or Turkish. I speak of Europeans long resident in the country…”

I shall now take up Ellen’s story again, at the point where she was about to leave for Constantinople, where she was to spend so many happy hours (and a few challenging ones). In May 1872, the Khedival family escaped from the growing heat, firstly to the summer palace at Gezireh.

The Gezireh Palace

Ellen compared the Gezireh Palace to a “miniature Versailles”; it had elaborate gardens, and even a private zoo. The place was even run on French lines: “The servants engaged at the palace are French, with Arabs under them, because everything at Gezireh (except the harem) is European”. Zeynab and her brother Ibrahim lived in a wing of the palace that was usually reserved for important visitors. This was “delightfully situated; some of the apartments looked down onto the river [Nile]; others on the lovely garden. Ellen was fascinated by the exotic trees growing in this garden.

Still, Ellen was very much looking forward to visiting Constantinople, where she knew the Court usually spent some of the year, and feared that it would remain instead at Gezireh, which meant that she would have gained no “respite from the mosquitoes of Choubrah.” So she was very glad when towards the end of May the harem moved to the Ras-el-Tin Palace at Alexandria, as the prelude to voyaging to Constantinople.

The Ras-el-Tin Palace

In Alexandria, the educational staff were lodged at the Hôtel d l’Europe, in the Grand Square, driving each day to Ras-el-Tin, which was then about two miles west of Alexandria. After the dryness of Cairo, Ellen found the sea air at Alexandria very refreshing, and every one seems to have enjoyed themselves: “Our days passed very pleasantly. We were a very united party, never interfered with one another, and enjoyed each other’s society when we met. As at Minieh [on the excursion up the Nile] and at Choubrah, every one tried to please the Princess, and as she was very easy to please, everybody succeeded.”

Meanwhile, Ismail remained at Cairo, on business. And with the political and economic situation of Egypt worsening, no doubt he had a great deal to concern himself with. However, on 1 June 1872 he arrived in Alexandria. Even so, Ellen was unsure if this meant “an immediate departure for Constantinople… Zohrab Bey [the doctor]… told us that His Highness [i.e. Ismail] spoke of going at once to Constantinople, so that we should do well to hold ourselves in readiness to depart at an hour’s notice.” But Ellen had heard this before, and remembering the constant delays to the excursion up the Nile, felt that “we had been too much accustomed to this sort of thing to lay too much stress upon it.”

None the less, the following day, Sunday, Ellen and Mr. Mitchell were told to go aboard the steam-yacht Mahroussah by one o’clock, to be ready to accompany Zeynab and the Second Princess on the voyage. Fortunately this presented no difficulty, as the educational staff had not “unpacked any more than was absolutely necessary”, since arriving in Alexandria.

And so, finally, Ellen was to set off on her long hoped-for adventure, one of her trips of a lifetime, to the ancient, beautiful and fascinating city of Constantinople…

To be continued.

Apples, Halloween & little Molly Hawkins

2008-10-23T11:36:00.000-07:00

The traditions of Halloween that we see now in our westernized world of ‘trick or treating’ actually stem from Ireland hundreds of years back when the local farmers would gather together and organise a posse which went around the village knocking on each door and asking for food and items which could supply the village with a huge feast and a bonfire.
People who gave generously were promised good luck whilst those that didn’t were cursed with warnings of bad luck to follow through the coming year.
When many Irish immigrants went across to America in the 1800s they also took their Irish traditions with them which finally became adapted to the Halloween celebrations which we see today.

Here in the UK I recall celebrating Halloween back in the 60s at home with my sister and a few school friends; we had nothing like the kind of Halloween celebrations that are evident today with wonderful costumes and groups of children going out trick or treating.
Our celebrations back then consisted of activities such as ‘Bobbin for apples’ where a big basin sized bowl was filled with water and we had to try to get one out of the bowl with our teeth whilst keeping our hands firmly clasped together behind our backs.
By the time you actually managed to get an apple you’d probably be absolutely drenched from head to foot.
Also on an apple theme we used to hang them from strings along the top of a door frame and try to eat them this way also with hands behind back. Easier said than done I might add.
Apples must have been the one thing we had in abundance because I also recall us peeling them in one continual strip and throwing the peel over our shoulders and seeing what letter the peel looked like as we turned round, this we were told meant to represent our future husband’s first initial. Although in my case after being married 3 times I’d must have gotten a different initial every time, which might have meant me getting through quite a few apples!

We always made a jack O lantern from turnips which we placed in the window; apparently it was more traditional in England to use turnips rather than pumpkins.
Once again this idea stemmed from us carving out the turnips and putting a light inside to scare off the evil spirits. This was another custom which the Irish immigrants took with them to America but found pumpkins there in plentiful supply so adapted the humble turnip into the wonderful Jack O lanterns we all know and love so well.

Older more ancient customs date back to the ancient Celts who celebrated the 1st of November as the beginning of the New Year. Whilst October the 31st was the festival of Samhain or the Feast of the dead, Celts believed that the souls of the dead could return at this time and were able to mingle with the living as the veil between the two worlds were at the thinnest, also fairies and goblins along with all sorts of other-worldly creatures of the may cross unseen realms may cross over to our world at the special time of Samhain.
The dead ancestors were honoured by laying places at the table and food being left out for them.
Farmers also had the task of deciding which of the livestock needed to be slaughtered to see them through the dark winter months ahead.
The big village bonfires were a time of much merriment and feasting, people wore masks, costumes and danced, this also was meant to scare off evil spirits,
Divinations took place, often involving the village bonfire.

Bonfire traditions in ancient Ireland insisted that every fire (including hearth fires) throughout the emerald Isle be put out until the Samhain fire be lit at a sacred site known as Tlachtga, once the fire burnt brightly here it was then acceptable to relight the fires throughout Ireland.
Tlachtga is a hill named after the daughter of the druid Mogh Ruith whom some folk say was at one time a Goddess.
The tribes gathered at the ritual centre of another sacred site 12 miles away at one of the most known sacred sites in Ireland called ‘Tara’ for what was called the Feast of Tara, this unique centre it is steeped in a rich diverse tapestry of tales consisting of The Goddess, Kings, druids, and ancient folklore.
Tara is a beautiful serene mound in Co. Meath, recently it has been sadly vandalized by the Irish government who refuse to stop the building of a motorway destroying a beautiful irreplaceable site of cultural & historical importance, despite massive ongoing global protests.

Last year I celebrated Halloween in my town by researching some of our local folklore and finding the best spooky stories I could.
This culminated in me organising a Halloween ghost walk and taking several children along all in fancy costume. I couldn’t resist going as a witch myself. J

One of the more well known local stories is of a little ghost girl who haunts the Old Town of Hastings her name is little Molly Hawkins.
Her tale is quite sad; she was the daughter of a local fisherman back in the times when a river ran through the town to the sea and a great divide between the wealthy and poor existed (even more so than today!!!)

Molly’s mom had died in childbirth leaving her to take care of 5 younger brothers and sisters. Despite living in abject poverty little Molly had a reputation for skipping along and laughing. Sometimes Molly had to resort to stealing food from the local traders whom usually turned a blind eye to it knowing of her family circumstances.
Unfortunately however times grew hard for the traders and they decided to put a stop to Molly stealing and on this particular occasion she stole four big rosy red apples, concealing them in her raggedy dress pockets as she skipped her way home, suddenly behind her she heard a whistle blow and the cries of “stop thief”.
Three guards chased poor Molly as she ran up the High Street to a place known as ‘Waterloo passage’ which had a wooden bridge over the river Bourne; it was here that little Molly lost her footing along with her life.
The traders decided to just watch and let her drown as a clear message to other children not to steal from them.

Since then her spirit lingers in Waterloo Passage and many people claim to have sighted her skipping along laughing with her raggedy clothes, shawl and hair braids. Quite frequently a single apple is found in the passageway which the locals say is Molly returning what she stole from them.

When we went on our Halloween ghost walk we decided to take little Molly a new ribbon for her hair which my daughter had kept safely tucked in her pocket all evening, the plan was that we’d leave it in Waterloo passage for the spirit of Molly. When we got to the passage the children all stopped and were pointing at the floor and there we saw a big rosy red apple.
I said to my daughter that it was probably off Molly and that we should leave her the ribbon in exchange, but when she went to get the ribbon out it had already mysteriously vanished. My daughter insists that little Molly had already taken it.

We all liked to think of little Molly on our way home, imagining her skipping along,
Laughing and being very pleased with her new hair ribbon. Suffice to say we had a most memorable Halloween last year; perhaps I’ll take Molly a big bag of apples all for herself this year.

By Rosie Weaver

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-10-15T09:08:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Ellen and Lucie Duff-Gordon; the bad times amongst the good
I have, in this thread, tried to put Ellen’s description of life in the Khedival court into a historical perspective by comparing it with other generally contemporary accounts. In my last posting, I mentioned Lady Lucie Duff-Gordon (1821-1869) – not to be mistaken, by the way, with the later, Lady Lucy [note spelling] Duff-Gordon, a fashionable dressmaker and a somewhat controversial survivor of the Titanic.

Lucie became very much attached to the ordinary Egyptians, and so wrote a great deal about the disastrous effects of Ismail’s high taxation and forced labour on the ordinary Egyptian population. She wrote two well-known books about her experiences, Letters from Egypt (published 1865) and Last letters from Egypt (published posthumously by her daughter in 1875). The books take the form of collections of letters, written to her friends and relatives since her arrival in Egypt in 1862.

It is possible that Ellen could have read Letters from Egypt before taking up her appointment with the Khedive, although (possibly diplomatically) does not say so.

Indeed, Ellen may have felt that the political situation of the time was nothing to do with her, which was no doubt true; her opinions would have counted for very little – whilst Lucie, on the other hand, was a well-connected, titled woman, with an independent income, who was already an established author when she went to Egypt. Ellen’s place was simply to teach two children.

Besides, Ellen was plainly no-one’s fool; she would have been very careful about what she taught, and said to Zeynab. In fact she was reminded now and then by people such as Zohrab, the doctor, that she was in the Khedive’s pay, in effect one of the harem, and expected to that extent, to act accordingly. However, to compensate for this her pay may have been very good – she mentions that other European servants were attracted to work for the Khedival Court by high wages – and in addition, she was gaining opportunities for travel, and new experiences, that she could never hope to obtain otherwise.

Still, there are rare glances at the Egypt beyond the Palace windows. One such was when the Nile excursion had come to a premature halt at Minya. Ellen describes it thus:

“I saw a curious light one morning while dressing in my cabin [on board the dahabieh]. I heard a strange humming noise as of many voices, and looking out, I saw a large steamer coming down the river, and behind it in tow were five immense flat-bottomed boats and two dahabiehs. The boats were crowded with men, forced labourers from the Upper Nile, who were brought down to work on the railway which the Viceroy [i.e. Ismail] was constructing in Upper [sic] Egypt. There must have been several thousands.”

Lucie Duff-Gordon witnessed much the same thing a decade earlier, in 1862:

“The other day four huge barges passed us towed by a steamer and crammed with hundreds of the poor souls [i.e. conscript labourers] torn from their homes to work at the Isthmus of Suez, or some palace of the Pasha’s, for a nominal piastre a day, and find their own bread and water and a cloak… One of my crew… recognised some relations of his from a village close to Assouan. There was much shouting and…[he] looked very mournful all day. It may be his turn next.”
(Letters from Egypt)

Indeed, Lucie had much to say about the human misery behind forced labour (usually known as corvée labour):

“…the Europeans applaud, and say, ‘Oh, but nothing could be done without forced labour,’ and the poor Felaheen [farmers] are marched off in gangs like convicts, and families starve, and (who’d have thought it) the population keeps diminishing.”
(Letters from Egypt)

It is true that corvée labour had been used in Egypt since ancient times. However, it was to be used during the 19th century to a greater extent than before, in order to construct projects like the Suez Canal, new irrigation work, and railways, and this was to cause increasing hardship to the fellaheen – leading, of course, to increasing resistance to it. It was to eventually come to and end during the 1880s (it was sometimes used after its official cessation).

Lord Cromer, who effectively became the ruler of Egypt following the British occupation in 1882, unsurprisingly claimed that its abolition had been a British accomplishment. However, its end was due more to the changing economic and political nature of Egypt; British officials had actually been ambivalent about banning it, at least until the large agricultural estates bought by rich Englishmen in Egypt had been developed by its use.

Forced labour was not the only bad thing to be found in Egypt at the time. Another was the looting of antiquities and old buildings, and both Ellen and Lucie wrote about it.

Ellen went on several occasions to see the Tombs of the Caliphs, part of Cairo’s huge Northern Cemetery. The tombs date from around 1382-1517, and by the 19th century had fallen into bad repair, as this photo from the 1870s, when Ellen visited them, shows:

On one of these occasions, a member of the party that Ellen was with was a tourist, referred to by her only as Mr. P. “P” decided to help himself to one of the surviving carved lattice-screens of the tombs: “at last he succeeded in detaching a piece. I thought it such a pity that I remonstrated with him, but he replied that it would all crumble away sooner or later, and he would like to have a bit of it; so he took it.”

Lucie Duff-Gordon also visited these tombs, and wrote that:

“Omar [her Egyptian servant] witnessed the destruction of some sixty-eight or so of the most exquisite buildings – the tombs and mosques of the Arab Khaleefehs, which Said Pasha [Ismail’s predecessor] used to divert himself with bombarding for practice for his artillery… Thus the Pasha added the piquancy of sacrilege to barbarity.”
(Letters from Egypt)

It was, unfortunately by no means an uncommon attitude, at the time. Ismail himself was busy demolishing huge areas of old Cairo in order to rebuild the city to make it look like Paris, and the first ruler of his dynasty, Muhammad Ali, had even wanted to demolish the Pyramids themselves, to provide building-material for a barrage across the Nile!

Yet another example is a businessman called George Pangals built a exhibit themed on a Cairo street, for the Columbian Exhibition in Chicago, USA, in 1893. He searched the older parts of Cairo for any historical architectural features that he could find, and was to boast later that he: “went to work with a vim that would have done credit to a vandal… in about nine months, over fifteen residences had been despoiled of their entire woodwork, and over fifty others had contributed their share of carved panels, doors, etc.”
(Quoted in Whose Pharaohs, by D. M. Reid, 2002, University of California Press).

To be continued...

Goddess Reiki

2008-10-14T11:30:00.000-07:00

Goddess Reiki has recently been given an assortment of labels which practitioners use to describe the healing energies of Our Sacred Mother of 10,000 names.
Within the Fellowship of Isis we refer to the term as ‘Isian Healing Rays’ whereby we receive the Goddess given energies which transmute situations requiring healing.

Just about every conceivable human condition & affliction can be transmuted by My Lady of All Magic & Healing whom I call Isis. Within my Reiki practices I also call upon her in her aspects of Green Tara who presides over what is known as the violet
flame Reiki .
Personally I also resonate with Sekhmet the lioness headed goddess of healing, one of her forms of Reiki is known as‘Sekhem’.
Although she is The Goddess of 10,000 names and her other reflective aspects resonate more with some people than others do, each of us must find our own relationship with whichever goddess we are drawn to work with.
Healing may occur whereby an old problem (including physical ailments & emotional conditions) are healed in an unexpected way and a new resolve is found that had not presented its self before.
Perhaps for example we find a new way to continue with the same pain which minimises its impact on us, or a new nutrition regime may hold the key to bodily imbalances or maybe a remedy that had not been thought of before suddenly comes to light.
Miracle cures do occur with Reiki healing although there are no guarantees that a particular ailment be totally cured but what most practitioners will agree on is that the recipient of healing energies will receive some benefit or other from it, even a terminal illness may be treated not as a cure but to bring a peaceful transition from one life into the next.

The Healing rays of the Goddess are natural and spontaneous and can not be controlled by anyone, although we may channel them as Reiki practitioners to where they are most needed guided by Isis.
Recipients of the Isian Healing Rays don’t always benefit immediately from the rays that are given to them although many do feel an instant effect which is very pleasant & energising. For others though it is as if the healing rays of Isis have a job that takes more time to work on a number of levels which may be spiritual, emotional & physical. Each experience is personal and unique.

Sometimes healing is not to do with a ‘cure’ of an ailment but about a whole fresh new perspective on the malaise itself and what has bought us to where we are at that time.
If we’re experiencing the same old pains over & over again then obviously some message is being overlooked that we may not have been able to see before.

Stress eventually takes its toll manifesting as some physical ailment or other which is the bodies response to our emotional being – in other words we’re being given a clear message to stop or move on from a situation that has caused the pain in the first place.

In the book ‘You Can Heal Your Life’ is a wonderful list of physical ailments which the healing author ‘Louise Hay’ presents to understand the underlying psychic reasons behind them.
It’s quite a comprehensive list and covers just about every illness imaginable,
Next to it she gives the psychic/emotional reasoning such as, for example:

Pain in the shoulders is to do with feeling tremendously overburdened & put up on, as if you are carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders.
Stomach problems may be related to not being to literally stomach a situation you may find yourself in, perhaps you hate your job or home life & may be experiencing constant tummy upsets of one sort or another.

By applying the list to personal situations it really does make sense to work with to gain some further insights.

Reiki symbols have been veiled in secrecy in the past but now they are becoming public knowledge thanks to individuals who wish for the symbols to be freely available to all.
Symbols are wonderful to work with they are quite literally the symbolic language of the universe. Try experimenting yourself with them.

Try visualizing spinning upon your out stretched hands (palms up) the figure eight ‘8’ lying on its side in blue light (see image below), you should at the very least feel a sort of energised tickling sensation, with its energy continually flowing it is the symbol we find in the Tarot card ‘The Magician’
The Magician is all about ‘transformation’ and ‘alchemy’ using his intentions to bring about a change in circumstances.
It is an ancient symbol of infinity, without beginning and without end; its free flowing energy continues and is a good energetic symbol to use in Reiki to kick starts a flow of healing rays if you humbly request that the goddess turns on and makes this energy available to you.

Lets face it Reiki has become a huge money spinner for some people who insist that Reiki may only be practiced in a certain way which will be given once you hand
over X amount of cash.
Although I do believe in a fair exchange of energy for someone offering tuition, be that monetary or some other arranged equivalent which is fair for the service offered. I don’t however feel that the extortionate fee’s advertised by ‘Reiki Masters’ can be justified and this wonderful free universal energy has been denied to many individuals who would like to learn the principles involved for themselves.
The following quote is from a wonderful website (the link is at the end of this article) offering free attunements to all:

“Reiki healers do NOT need certificates. You can heal even without these fancy embellishments hanging on your wall. Paper is only provided for those who must prove that they have acquired a certain degree of mastery”

In my own practice I first of all see an image of the winged Goddess Isis in my minds eye standing behind me, above her head she has a glowing spinning ball of energy (you can see this image of Isis in many ancient Egyptian relief paintings.)
Sometimes I ‘feel’ her feathery soft protective wings wrap around my body.
Next I visualize the sign of a spinning golden Ankh symbol above my head and then I feel the light of Isis radiating from her solar disc above her head and flooding down into my crown and then throughout my entire body.
The sensation is quite distinct; I can only describe it as sparkly silver rain for want of better words.
The next part is that she will guide me to direct her healing rays where they are most required, sometimes I will see colours and symbols to focus on, and the symbols are always 3d and often are spinning or moving. These she will instruct to be placed where needed.
For example for emotional healing I may use the ‘sei he kei’ symbol shown above in the level 2 reiki diagram. This I would see floating from Isis to me, through my hands and then down into the crown of the person receiving healing and then staying in the head area to work its magic if it was needed most their,.
It might continue as in some instances sinking lower to the heart chakra area if it is required more within that area or maybe even replicating itself to go to several places as required. The possibilities are endless.

We also may use Reiki on everything else that needs our help I’ve used it on computers, electrical equipment, even a blocked loo with miraculous results I might add, but always after using all of the logical methods first to resolve problems.
The goddess likes to see her children making an effort by helping themselves first, as do all good Mothers.
Any conceivable human situation can be assisted with healing energy including personal circumstances, animal/plants, family/community/global transformation.
Wherever we send our healing intentions & reiki symbols only good can come of it.

The healing itself is bestowed by the Goddess and this we must always remember and give thanks for; she is the source from where the energies flow & must eventually return.

Love & Hugs
Rosie
"Beannachd nas soilleir ort, agus air gach duine."
Brightest of blessings to you and all you hold dear.

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Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-10-12T09:29:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Not quite a thousand miles up the Nile...

How would it be best to classify Recollections of an Egyptian Princess? Despite its title it is about several things; Princess Zeynab and Kopsès, the Khedival Court, Egyptian society at a very important point in its history. To an extent, it is also about Ellen’s personal and career development; it must have been a really challenging and rewarding time of her life.

But most of all, it is a travel-book. Ellen took every opportunity to explore her surroundings, and so the book is, as much as anything, a description of Egypt, particularly Cairo, and Constantinople (Istanbul) during the 1870s. She was always ready, when her work allowed, to jump on a donkey, or other means of transport, and explore.

Like many other western women who went to Egypt she found independence. She was no longer bound by the restraints that 19th century society placed on women. For many this liberating experience was almost intoxicating.

Lucie Duff-Gordon

Until shortly before Ellen had arrived in Egypt, for instance, Lady Lucie Duff-Gordon had escaped from London society to live in a house built on part of Luxor Temple, where she had found complete fulfilment. Lucie was so bitterly critical of Ismail, and his economic policies, that he regarded her with enough suspicion to intercept her mail; there was even a (somewhat half-hearted) attempt on her life of the "make it look like an accident" kind.

A few years later, in 1877, Amelia Edwards was to take her famous "Thousand Mile" trip up the Nile, an experience which not only led her to write one of the classics of Eyptology, but to go on to help establish the Egypt Exploration Fund (now Society), which is still one of the foremost learned societies in British Egyptology.

Amelia Edwards

Florence Nightingale’s visit to Egypt in 1849-1850 was to lead to an intense spiritual experience, even having a vision in the Temple of Philae. (She was to write an essay titled "Visions of Temples", in which she related the various temples that she had seen to her spiritual ideas). Like so many other women at the time Miss Nightingale was desperately searching for some meaning in the trivialised life that so many women of her social class, and era, were forced to endure. And Egypt seems to have focused her thoughts; the following year she was to study nursing at Kaiserswerth, Germany, which was to lead on to the achievements for which she has become famous.

(Ellen’s own religious beliefs, by the way, do not seem to have been profound. She attended Anglican services as would have been expected of a governess of her time, and describes how she sat through some dreadfully boring sermons. As a governess she would of course have been expected to accept whichever religion her pupil of the time was being brought up in, and so no doubt on a professional level it would have been helpful to her not to have any very strong religious views of her own).

But back to Ellen’s experiences in Egypt.

Immediately after Bairam, Zeynab and Ibrahim, together with their companions Kopsès and Shefket (Ibrahim’s companion, a boy about two years older than him, who was described by Ellen as an "Abyssinian") and the educational staff were to take a trip up the Nile. However, the children had said so much about all the things they were going to see, that first the four Princesses and then Ismail himself decided to go – "our modest party swelled into a royal progress", Ellen wrote.

However, this was to in fact spoil the entire excursion. For a start, it lead to the trip being continually postponed, until Ismail was able to leave Cairo.

At first, thinking that only the children and educational staff would go, Ellen worried about the arrangements for washing sanitary towels, which were not, then, usually disposable, during the trip: "Bearing in mind the periodical cares of the laundry, which often made me seriously contemplate substituting paper for linen." (No doubt blotting-paper, or something like it, would have worked well enough in an emergency).

However, it’s not clear whose sanitary requirements Ellen was thinking of; possibly Zeynab’s and Kopsès’, who would have probably have reached their menarche at about this time, unless Ellen herself had a particularly late menopause.

Indeed, as a Victorian, putting cleanliness next to godliness, she was also worried about how the general laundry would be done. However, as things turned out, she would have done better thinking about food, rather than laundry.

The trip was postponed many times. As Ellen put it: "the cry of "wolf!" was repeated several times, on each occasion with less and less effect, until we began to disbelieve the whole affair." But finally, on 20 January 1872, the trip commenced, from Boulak, the river-port of Cairo.

A Khedival flotilla on the Nile, circa 1880s, perhaps showing some of the steamboats that accompanied Ellen and Zeynab's trip.

The royal fleet consisted of "six large steamers and seven dahabiehs [sailing houseboats]… had the number been only those originally proposed, we should all have been together in one steamboat, as was proper and consistent; but as it was, the larger vessels were taken up by his Highness, his harem, and his general suite, and the smallest steamer [called the Azaziah] was reserved for Ibrahim Pahsa and the Princess. When cabins had been allotted to them, to their two companions, Shefket and Kopsès, to the Princess’s French maid, and to Zohrab Bey [the harem physician] and his nephew, there was no room left for us."

A dahabieh (foreground) and a steamer of the 1870s

So, they were crammed on board a tiny dahabieh, that was towed behind the Azaziah. Right from the start they had difficulties with this:

"We had been told that everything would be prepared for us, so that we had nothing to provide except our own clothing. When we went on board… we found that nothing was ready for us… nothing but the barely furnished cabins." Fortunately they were able to hurry back to Choubrah Road, to get some furnishings from their house. (I can’t help but wonder what kind of monumental tantrum Emmeline Lott would have thrown at this point!)

The fleet set off, stopping first at the site of Memphis, and then crossing to Saqqara, where Mariette was busy at work in the Serapeum with his usual excavation tool, dynamite (see the post on Maggie Benson and Nettie Gourlay). They also visited the tombs of Ty and Ptah-hotep (in fact mastabas), both of which are a few hundred yards directly east of the Serapeum.

This was in fact an extremely bad time for Egyptian antiquities. Archaeological excavation was done by people who were no better than looters, temples were being destroyed to provide building-material for sugar-factories, and sebakh (fertiliser) diggers were removing the sites of ancient towns.

On the way back from Saqquara, Ellen’s donkey-boy thought that she would be impressed by his making the donkey – which he called the "Flying Dutchman" - gallop at high speed. The jolting made Ellen lose all her possessions, including her vital spectacles – which were, however, fortunately found by other members of the party following behind.

Zeynab and Ibrahim were taught on board the Azaziah. This meant the dahabieh being drawn alongside the steamer each morning, to allow the teaching staff to come on board it. The dahabieh was then pulled along behind, on a long rope, making reaching it impossible. This was bad enough if anyone wanted something from their cabins during the day, but was a major problem if anyone should be left marooned on board the dahabieh, as there they had nothing to eat or drink, all the food being kept on board the Azaziah. "Had we known to what we should have been exposed," Ellen wrote, "we would have brought with us some preserved meat in tins, some Huntley & Palmers biscuits, tea, coffee, and sugar, a [water] filter, and an Etna for boiling water."

In an attempt to industrialise Eypt, various Khedives had built large numbers of sugar-refineries (often from the stones of ancient temples). Despite their cost to Egyptian heritage, the refineries were not much of an economic success, as the party were soon to find out.

At el-Minya the fleet stopped so that Ismail could inspect a number of sugar-mills that he had built there. There was a palace at Minya, and a line of troops held sheets of cloth like two walls from the harem steamer to the palace, to "enable the wives of his Highness and their suite to disembark without being exposed to the gaze of men."

The stop was at first expected to take only two or three days, so that the Khedive could put the mills into working order. However, day after day was to pass without them continuing onwards.
So far during the trip Ellen had based her teaching on "history, and charming tales of fiction" (presumably to avoid the history becoming monotonous). The Khedive himself had wanted the childrens’ studies to be "exclusively devoted to the history of Eypt", and undoubtedly this would have been the perfect opportunity to teach Egyptian history; Ellen says that it was indeed her, and Mr. Freeland’s own plan.

Ellen lists the books that she taught this from: Mariette’s Aperçu de l’Histoire d’Egypt, and his Itinéraire. She also used a section called L’Egypte ancienne et moderne of a book called the Histoire universelle. In English they had Sharpe’s History of Egypt. They also had guides to contemporary Egypt.

To us, Mariette’s books show just what a limited grasp he actually had of Egyptian history, even by the standards of the time. Ellen described his version of it:

"Firstly came the Ancient Empire, the age of the pyramids, a period when the art of engraving on stones reached a perfection which has never since been attained. Then the Middle Empire, which was in existence when Abraham appeared, and to the last king of which Joseph was minister. Then came the New Empire, the age of Moses. In a voyage up the Nile the most frequent and glorious monuments belong to this epoch. Lastly, the Lower Empire, in which Egypt fell under the dominion of strangers, Greeks and Romans."

However, marooned at the palace at Minya for an increasing length of time, without anything to relate historical studies to, Ellen reverted back to teaching English one day, French the other.
She also organised games of rounders (the game known as base-ball in America) and hide and seek. At a time when physical activity for "young ladies" was still disapproved of in England, this was enlightened education! Still, she had to make allowances for Zeynab, whose "plumpness interfered rather with her speed."

Confined together in the palace at Minya, Ellen had an opportunity to get to know Kopsès better. "Kopsès", she wrote, "had great vivacity, and wonderful tact for one so young a person: she never intruded her opinions, but when required she expressed them with a free and independent bearing which to our preconceived ideas was totally inconsistent with slavery."

It was at Minya that Ellen unintentionally committed a breach of etiquette, asking Zeynab what her mother’s name was – so far, Ellen had only known her as the "Second Princess". Zeynab declined to answer, and to her great embarrassment Ellen learned that it was the height of bad manners to mention a woman’s name outside the harem.

Zeynab's mother, the "Second Princess" - Princess Jananyar

The men of the party amused themselves by slaughtering the local wildfowl, Ellen by watching dahabiehs sail up and down, each flying the national flag of the person who had hired it – people who were often indeed known to her. They all still looked forward to going further upstream, none more so than the teaching staff’s dragoman (interpreter and message-carrier), Shaheen. One of Shaheen’s wives lived above the First Cataract (at Aswan), and he had not seen her for many years. Despite this, it seems he had plans to take a third wife!

But in the end, whatever was wrong with the sugar-mills, not even the Khedive himself, it seemed, could put them into working order. (In fact Minya was instead to later become a centre of Egypt’s cotton-trade). And so after three weeks, the journey was abandoned. The teaching-staff were sent back to Cairo by special train – although when they arrived, no carriage was available to take them back to Choubrah Road, which resulted in some difficulty and ingenuity to reach home!

Life was, for the moment, to return to normal. But plans were being made for Zeynab’s marriage…

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-10-09T08:40:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (continued)

Ellen's life in Egypt begins

It is likely that Emmeline Lott’s very public criticisms of the Khedival family and its morals and educational provision had been very embarrassing to Ismael, who prided himself on abandoning the country’s “former ways”, and was to say, in 1879, that Egypt “is no longer in Africa; we are now part of Europe.”

Ellen must have at least been aware of Lott’s books, and indeed seems to have had some hesitation in going to Egypt: “I was anxious to obtain every possible information before undertaking the duty [as Zeynab’s governess].”

It is perhaps unfortunate that Lott arrived in Egypt at a time when the Court was on the cusp between Ottoman traditions and western expectations. She does seem to have had certain genuine difficulties, such as not being paid. (It might have been that her books contained an element of revenge for this).

Lott also claimed that it had become suspected in the harem that she had become Ismael’s mistress. Whether or not this was true, it would at least explain Ismael’s obvious caution about who he next employed as governesses; Miss Maclean, who was living in Cairo with her father, and the elderly Ellen. Young women, unaccompanied, were plainly seen as too much of a potential embarrassment.

None the less, it is likely that Lott exaggerated, and sensationalised her books (which were, after all, plainly meant for the popular market). Furthermore, times had changed since she had been employed. As Ellen explained: “Manners and customs have become … modified in Egypt during the last few years by the increasing number of Europeans…” And so, after her initial doubts, Ellen could say that: “All that I heard tended to encourage me.”

Indeed, care had obviously been taken to assemble a professional, experienced educational staff for the Khedival family, and furthermore one that would be adaptable to conditions abroad. Ellen showed in her book that she was certainly a dedicated teacher; although it was also certainly a wonderful travel adventure for her, as it would be to anyone, she shows that she never lost sight of what she was there for. One of the main threads throughout her book is how, and what she taught Zeynab and Kopsès; how she varied her lessons, how she made them relevant, how she tried to ensure that lessons were not interrupted, and so on.

This is in contrast to Lott, who only rarely mentions what or how she taught. Indeed, she claims that her teaching responsibilities were progressively reduced, to the point of her finally being told not to educate Prince Ibrahim at all. (She is careful not to explain why).

Ellen quickly realised that Kopsès was more intelligent than Princess Zeynab. However, “it would have been a false kindness to cultivate her [i.e. Kopsès’] powers according to their capability, at the risk of exciting ill-feeling on the part of the Princess, on whom she was wholly dependent.” Indeed, Kopsès was one of those fortunate people who seem to have so many gifts; intelligence, athletic ability, and beauty. I have a feeling that it would have been hard for most people to have stood comparison with her! Indeed, for all her professionalism, there is little doubt that she was Ellen’s favourite (if never favoured) pupil.

On the other hand Zeynab seems to have been academically something of a slow developer: “She was of a character that developed late, and required great encouragement.” Which Ellen, naturally, gave, continually finding ways to hold Zeynab’s interest, for all that she was “not quick at lessons.”

This was one of the reasons why Ellen was opposed to the tradition of shutting all females up in a harem. Indeed, many visitors to them remarked on what dreary places they were; Emmeline Lott was particularly sarcastic about this, referring to them as “the abode of bliss.” Ellen found that in the Palace harem there was an “entire absence of anything to promote amusement or mental occupation”, and dreaded the day when Zeynab would – inevitably – be confined to one.

Given that she wore clothing that was almost absurdly unsuitable for the climate, it is not surprising that Ellen found the heat, and sometimes very considerable humidity of Cairo a constant problem. Indeed, heatstroke must have been a real danger. And at first she was also greatly irritated by “myriads of mosquitoes and sand-flies”. However, she eventually became so used to them that “after two or three years I became accustomed to them and at last ceased to notice them altogether”.

Indeed, there is no doubt that Ellen had a very resilient character. After all, she was at the modern retirement age for women when she went to start a new life in Egypt, and yet remained physically very active, sometimes under quite demanding conditions. She does mention that she had two physical conditions – she was extremely short-sighted, and had to wear spectacles – and, towards the end of her time in Egypt she started to suffer from a mild heart-condition, which eventually contributed to her death.

Fortunately she seems to have escaped any major health-problems whilst in Egypt, although Mrs. Freeland’s children did suffer from opthalmia – a very common problem in Egypt.

She always rose early – usually at around 6 a.m., and often woke at dawn to watch the sunrise (which is indeed a special experience in Egypt; I have seen the sun rise over Luxor and Cairo myself, and it is truly a magical time). However, she does admit to over-sleeping on one occasion; when visiting the Pyramids with Zeynab and Ibrahim the educational staff were to set off especially early, to avoid the heat of later in the day, but due to the alarm-clock not having yet been invented(!) the carriage arrived for them before they were quite up and ready.

It is plain from Ellen’s book that she was a natural travel-writer. She was keen to explore, and was very observant, as well as extremely descriptive. She wanted to see as much as possible, and took every opportunity to do so. One of her favourite excursions was to the Ezbekea Gardens:

The Ezbekea Gardens as Ellen would have known them

“The Ezbekea Gardens were very different then to what they have since become. At that time they were a quiet resort where one could walk or sit unmolested for an hour or two. There was, and is a rockery, something like that in the Bois de Boulogne; a cascade, a cavern, and paths in and out… comfortable seats were scattered all over the garden, but the Arabs seemed to think them especially placed for their convenience, and were generally found on them asleep, stretched out at full length.”

This passage is also interesting, in that it suggests that Ellen maintained some kind of link with Egypt; how else could she have known what the Gardens were like in the 1890s?

To make her excursions she was happy to find a particularly good donkey to carry her. And:

“… wishing to secure him for further excursions, I asked his name.
“Yankee Doodle,” said the [donkey] boy.
“Oh, he is American, is he?” said I.
“Yes missus; in English, Lalla Rookh!” – rather a free translation.”

(Lalla-Rookh was the Persian heroine of a poem by Thomas Moore, published in 1817).

Ellen also, naturally visited the then new Cairo Opera-House, which had opened in 1869 (it burned down in 1971, to be replaced by the present Cairo Opera House).

The old Cairo Opera House

“I must not omit to mention our first visit to the opera. The play [sic] was “Aïda”… it was doubly interesting to us as it recalled the scenes of our voyage up the Nile”. (This will be described in the following post).

Verdi’s Aïda – which was not in fact, despite popular belief, written for the opening of the Suez Canal - had finally been completed in 1871 after various delays, and was to have 12 performances during the 1871-2 season. It was to remain a favourite at the Cairo Opera House (and of course elsewhere).

To Ellen, the interior furnishings of the Opera House, especially the boxes reserved for members of the Khedival harem, were as interesting as Aïda itself. The harem boxes were covered with a decorative metal mesh to prevent their occupants from being seen. They also had a separate entrance from outside.

Ellen first visited a harem when she was invited to the Abdeen Palace during Id al-Fitr, or as the Ottomans (and therefore Ellen) called it, Bairam. This festival follows the holy month of Ramadan, and traditionally involved receptions and visits to friends.

So it was that Ellen and Mrs. Freedland were invited to visit by Ismail’s wives, and also by his mother Princess Hoshiar, the “Validè Effendimiz” (translatable as “Mother of our Ruler”), who was usually referred to in western accounts as the “Validè Princess.”

Ellen and Mrs. Freedland first called on Ismail’s wives. Princess Zeynab had taught Ellen a polite greeting in Turkish to say to her mother during her Bairam visit. Somewhat embarrassingly, however, Ellen “thought I had it by heart, but I broke down in the middle of it. The Princesses laughed, and took it in very good part…”

However, the formal visit was soon over, and Ellen and Mrs. Freedland went on to meet Princess Hoshiar. Some years before, Emmeline Lott had also been invited to call on the Validè Princess during Bairam, and had all too predictably decided to hate her, describing her in her book as “a most shrewd and accomplished intriguante, one who would … “stick at nothing”, absolutely nothing”. (This perhaps says more about Lott herself than about Hoshiar).

It was whilst visiting Princess Hoshiar that Ellen and Mrs. Freedland were invited to drink coffee and smoke pipes; a traditional form of hospitality. Lott had complained that on her Bairam visit the coffee and pipes had only been offered to the princesses. If this was indeed so, then we might wonder why Ellen and Mrs. Freedland were more warmly welcomed than Lott had been!

Although she did not of course usually smoke, Ellen none the less took a pipe, explaining that:

“Formerly it had been de rigeur to accept the pipe, but European visitors had become frequent in the harms, and the inmates soon saw that their visitors were unaccustomed to smoking, so that declining the pipe gave no offence. I did not know this then, so I took the pipe.”

The pipe itself was huge. It was “about five feet long, and the attendant rested the bowl on a silver plate in front of me.” However, with her usual ability to smile at herself, Ellen then described what happened:

“I held the tube [i.e. stem of the pipe] between my lips for some time, wondering how such a thing could give either pleasure or pain, when a slave crossed the room, and turning the bowl, I found that I had been holding it downwards! I never tried smoking after that.”

No lessons were given during Bairam, although Zeynab did call upon Ellen at the house in Choubrah Road. It was plainly just one of a number of formal visits that Zeynab was making that day, as she “was magnificently dressed in black velvet, made in the last [i.e. latest] Parisian fashion. The trimming was of white ostrich-feathers; a diamond brooch, which, with the pendants attached to it, was as large in circumference as an orange, sparkled on her chest. She wore diamond earrings, a clasp of the same precious stones at the waist, black velvet boots with diamond buckles, and a velvet hat with the same feather trimming as on the dress.”

Although this was impressive to adults, poor Zeynab herself was not enjoying herself. “She had a weary look, as if all this adornment did not add to her happiness, and taking my hand, she asked me to go up-stairs with her and read a story to her!” Diamonds, evidently, are not always a girl’s best friend…

Ellen received a letter asking her to make a Bairam visit to the Countess of Dudley (Lady Georgina Ward, 1846-1929), as the Earl and Countess of Dudley were at that time guests of the Khedive. Evidently Ellen’s experience in aristocratic households was valuable in more ways than one to Ismail!

In January 1872 Ellen, always ready to see as much as she could of Egypt, went to see the start of the pilgrimage caravan to Mecca which accompanied the Mahmal, a highly decorated litter, carried by camels, which contained a holy carpet.

A 19th century Mahmal setting off

The Khedive, or one of his sons, always took part in the starting ceremony. Therefore awnings, with tables and chairs under them, were provided for the comfort of the Khedive and the chief dignitaries, and this was by far the best place to watch from – “if by favour you can get to them” Ellen points out (as by implication she did). “It is necessary, however, to be very early, as the space is limited and soon filled”.

The Khedival family were at this time looking forward to a voyage up the Nile…

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-10-03T07:53:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

The mystery of Emmeline Lott
Ellen was aged 57 when she went to Egypt. This does not seem to have been a drawback to her appointment by the Khedive, who may, indeed, actually have preferred a mature woman to educate Zeynab during an important time in her development. What is more, there could be no doubt that Ellen was a highly experienced, and obviously capable governess - and, perhaps just as importantly, one who was used to aristocratic housholds and pupils.

No doubt Ismael would still have felt uneasy about Emmeline Lott's books about life in the palace, which were not only sexually suggestive, but were extremely insulting about the Khedival family and their domestic arrangements. Unlike Ellen, who realised that it was regarded as very bad manners to openly discuss anyone, and so who was reluctant to publish her memoirs even when almost destitute, Lott seems to have no hesitation about embarrassing anyone.

At this point, indeed, perhaps something needs to be said about Emmeline Lott, especially as her books have been compared to Ellen's. But, curiously, Lott remains a complete mystery; her dates are unknown, and she appears on no census, or record of births, marriages and deaths for the UK.

And this, surely, raises the question of whether she was, in fact, British, despite claiming to be. Indeed, one of her books was re-titled The English governess in Egypt, to emphasise it. But was it perhaps re-titled because questions were raised at the time about her nationality? After all, the name "Emmeline" was not, in the mid 19th century, an English name, although it did become popular towards the end of the century. In the extremely rare instances it does appear, the English spelling was "Emmiline". Of course it might have been a nickname, perhaps based on, e.g. "Emma". But none the less it does raise the possibility that she was not English (Lott is also, for example, a German name) and it must have led to suspicions at the time, which is perhaps why the title of her book was changed.

Certainly her books are written in very fluent English - indeed, a markedly journalistic, gossipy style. Plainly they are the work of an experienced writer, who knew what sold. So were they, just possibly, either ghosted, or sub-edited by her various publishers?

Lott's books cater for western fantasies about harems, and what - in western imagination - went on in them. She emphasises this in the subtitles of her books: Harem life in Egypt and constantinople; Nights in the harem, etc. Plainly these are titles that were intended to encourage sales, and aimed at a readership that was not particuarly interested in the - actually rather prosaic - reality of life in the palace harem. A harem was, after all, only the women's quarter of a house.

Rather hypocritically, however, Lott constantly protested that she found every thing to be offensively "lewd". (It is surely very significant that Ellen, who was the very model of an elderly, high Victorian spinster lady, never felt the same; indeed, she was quite willing to eventually go to live with Zeynab in the Gezireh and other palaces).

Unsurprisingly the harem angle sold plenty of copies of Lott's books, and has gained her some fame. The (English) Governess ran to at least four editions in the 19th century. But it does mean that they should be regarded with a degree of caution as historical documents. They do contain undoubted facts, but this is mixed with a great deal of far less valuable writing. They are most certainly not a sober, un-prejudiced, and un-sensational account of Egyptian court life at the time.

Indeed, there is a disturbingly racist element to Lott's books. She does not try to conceal the fact that she believed that the Egyptians, and the Ottomans were somehow "inferior." And this is no doubt why she almost exploded with rage when she was treated by them simply as - well, a governess. (It is hard to know what her contemporary audience would have felt about this; certainly any governess in England at the time would have been sacked for complaining even half so much as Lott did).

In fact whether she was an effective governess at all is open to question. She plainly had no liking for children, and spared no opportunity to be especially critical of Prince Ibrahim, who she taught. Ellen, on the other hand, took a far more professional, kindly and understanding approach. Indeed, a reader of their respective books might well wonder if they were writing about the same child, as regards Ibrahim).

Fortunately, however, for Ibrahim's development as a child if for no other reason, Lott finally decided that Egypt was just too horrid for her (or perhaps that she by now had gathered enough material for her books), and used her health as an excuse for ending her contract.

Unsurprisingly, then, Ellen felt that she needed to explain why she had taken notes. "I had always been in the habit of keeping a journal when travelling or residing in foreign countries." There is no particular reason to doubt this explanation; almost every middle and upper-class woman of the time was in fact expected to keep a diary; many men did, too. And given Ellen's reluctance to publish her "journal" for many years, it does not appear that she had publication as an aim.

Certainly she seems to have gained Ismael's confidence. Firstly he wished her to remain living with Zeynab after her marriage. Indeed, even after Zeynab's tragic early death Ellen's contract "still remained good, and... I heard that his Highness intended to employ me again." (However, national events were to prevent this).

This is not to say that Ellen liked everything that she found in Egypt. The food was not always to her taste, and in particular she found it hard to accept things like eunuchs, and slavery. She was also quick to see inefficiency and waste. However, throughout her narrative we hear the voice of someone who expected to find that things were different, and could be uncomfortable on occasion, but who was prepared to make the best of it. Indeed, had misfortune not overtaken Ismael and his family, she may very well have lived out her days in Egypt, ending up not in a small boarding-house but in a palace in Alexandria.

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-10-01T08:22:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

Egypt

Ellen arrived in Cairo in late 1871 to join the rest of the Khedive's educational staff, Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Freedland.

Mitchell, an Oxford University graduate was teaching the Khedive Ismael's eldest son Greek and Latin to prepare him for entry to Oxford. Freedland, who had come to Egypt with his wife and family taught the young Prince Ibrahim (1860-1927). Ellen was to teach Ibrahim's sister, Princess Zeynab (1859-1875).

Ibrahim and Zeynab, ca. 1870

Ellen also taught Zeynab's companion, a girl of the same age, a Circassian slave called Kopsès Hanem. Kopsès had been raised by Zeynab's mother, Princess Jananyar.

Kopsès as a young woman, ca. 1870s

Kopsès was to become a remarkable young woman, fluent in several languages and a capable organiser, as well as extremely beautiful. She was to become a great friend of Ellen's - indeed, I suspect, actually her favourite pupil.

Ellen was in fact Zeynab's second Governess. The first had been a Miss Maclean, the eldest daughter of a General Maclean, who had been Ibrahim's previous tutor (taking over in turn, it seems, from Emmeline Lott).

However, whilst Emmeline had been obliged to live in the palace harem, by the 1870s the teaching staff had their own house, in the fashionable Choubrah Road, Cairo, to where Zeynab and Ibrahim were brought each day in closed carriages. One of the positive things about the Khedive Ismael was that he was a great educational reformer, and besides accepted that the very enclosed, restricted world of the harem was not the best place for a young child to spend all her time.

Ibrahim and Zeynab were the only surviving children, out of six, of Ismael's second wife, Princess Jananyar (or Janazir) Berenici Khanum Effendimiz (1827-1912), who was known as the "Princess Epousée", or (at that time) the "Second Princess".

The harem was by this time situated in the huge new Abdeen Palace, one of several new palaces that had been built by Ismael. It would have been, in fact, still partly under construction when Ellen arrived in Egypt, not being fully complete until the mid 1870s.

Khedive Ismael

It is rather outside the scope of this short biography to go into much detail about Ismael. Besides, there is plenty written about him elsewhere. However, as he was an important - if somewhat behind the scenes - character in Ellen's story, he needs to be introduced.

Ismael succeeded as Walī of Egypt in 1863, subsequently becoming Khedive. He had been educated in Paris, and was to remain heavily westernised in his opinions. This was, too, a time when European powers, especially France, were becoming involved with Eygpt; Ismael's successor, Said I, for instance having given approval for the Suez Canal to be built. It was a project that Ismael was to also become heavily - and perhaps disastrously - involved with in turn.

Ismael gained considerable independence from the Ottoman Sultan, although remaining nominally subject to him. Ellen was to describe a state visit by the Khedival family to the Sultan in Constantinople (now Istanbul).

Ismael succeded to the throne at a time when Egypt had unusual prosperity, due to its cotton crop being in great demand as a result of American cotton becoming unavailable during the American Civil War (1861-1865). Egypt was flush with money, and Ismael wanted to spend.

He built factories, railways, a large new suburb of Cairo based on Parisian architecture, an opera-house, and several new palaces, including the Abdeen Palace. He wanted to create an Egyptian empire, and attempted to invade Ethiopia, although his army was humiliatingly defeated. And there was also, of course, the continuing and increasing expenditure on the Suez Canal.

The Abdeen Palace is a good example of the kind of building that Ismael was to become notorious for. The structure alone cost LE 700,000, with a further LE 2 million being spent on its furnishings. Used by subsequent kings and presidents of Egypt, the Palace has now been restored, and parts of it are open as a museum.

However, the extra revenue that Egypt received for cotton ended after the American Civil War. Ismael tried to raise money from international loans, and this resulted in Egypt falling into huge debt to western banks. By the time Ellen left Egypt the national debt was the equivalent of a hundred million pounds sterling. It is hard to calculate this as a modern amount, but it effectively meant national ruin for Egypt.

This of course had a calamitous effect. Lady Lucie Duff-Gordon, who lived in Egypt at the time described the desperate poverty and crippling taxes that resulted.

Ellen did not criticise Ismael in her book, no doubt out of loyalty to Zeynab. However, it did seriously affect her too; she had put all he savings in to Egyptian Bonds, which collapsed in value in 1875 after the Khedive was refused any further credit. "All I possessed was invested in Egyptian bonds", she wrote. "And they kept falling! falling! falling! They actually went down to £25!" (The purchasing equivalent of a mere £1,600 today, based on average prices).

Fortunately for Ellen, if not for Egypt, the British and French governments took over Egypt's finances (and eventually government) after 1875. Her bonds were saved, although the interest from them was reduced. Indeed, they may have been the "annuities" that she was living off at the time of her death.

In fact it was at this scary time that Ellen first considered publishing her memoirs: "My Anglo-Egyptian friends strongly advised me to publish my journal, and I revised it for that purpose." However, it was strongly against Egyptian culture at the time to write and publish an account of someone, and Ellen most certainly had no wish to offend her Egyptian friends. Only twenty years later, when the Khedive and Ibrahim were in exile, and both Zeynab and Kopsès were dead, and there was "no-one left to feel aggrieved at my publication" did she finally (and thankfully) write her book.

Eventually Egypt could stand no more of Ismael. It was not only the finances and tax, but Europeans and Turkish Circassians were favoured above Egyptians in the civil service and military. A separate - and resented - legal system for Europeans had also been established. And so, in 1882, the Urabi Revolution, named for its leader, Colonel Ahmed Urabi, broke out, with considerable violence taking place in Alexandria.

Britain, which had previously had little interest in Egypt, now felt that it had to protect the Suez Canal, which had become the vital link to India. And so a British military invasion followed, resulting in an occupation that was to last until 1954. Ismael was forced out of office, being replaced by his son, Tewfik. Ismael went into exile, first in Naples but later in a palace at Emirgan, in Turkey, where he was kept as a virtual prisoner by the Sulan until his death in 1895. Ellen likened Ismael's enforced stay at Emirgan to his being a fly, caught in a spider's web.

It would not be fair, however, to cast Ismael as a villain. Much of his spending was aimed at modernising Egypt. He completed the Suez Canal, which although a mixed blessing to Egypt at the time has considerably benefited the country since. He also created a network of railways, as well as an efficient postal-service.

And as I have mentioned, he was a great educational reformer, with one of his greatest achievements being in massively improving female education. And this was to serve future generations of Egyptians well. He also increased democracy in Egypt, setting up an Assembly which - for the first time - gave local, rural areas a voice in government. He also opposed slavery, eventually making it illegal in Egypt (although somewhat ironically making a great deal of use of corvée (conscript) labour for the Suez Canal, and his other schemes.

In the next post, I shall look at Ellen's adventures in Egypt.

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-09-30T07:24:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Continued)

It’s unfortunate that we know far more about what Ellen did during her five years in Egypt than what she did for the rest of her life. After the death of Zeynab, she stayed in Egypt for about a year, finally leaving in the autumn of 1876. She seems to have left mostly for health reasons, particularly a heart condition (which was indeed later to become a contributory factor of her death). Besides, she was by now aged 62, and obviously thinking about retirement.

She chose to live in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, a spa-town in the west of England that was increasingly popular with people who had worked in parts of Britain’s expanding empire, especially the Indian Raj. And here her sister, Anne Lydia came to join her in retirement.

Ellen would certainly have found Cheltenham a very agreeable place to live after the heat and dust of Cairo. Set at the foot of the Cotswold Hills, it is still a quiet, largely Regency town, with plenty of wide streets and parks – as well, of course, as its spa. Cheltenham had long been famous for its “cure”, and attracted many famous visitors, such as Princess (later Queen) Victoria, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, the Duke of Wellington and Lord Byron. Certainly the taste of the local spa-water can make you believe it must be doing you some good!

The town is now also particularly famous for its annual Gold Cup horse-race.

There was also plenty of reasonably cheap accommodation, to cater for those wanting to visit the spa, or who wished to retire there, and the Chennells sisters found accommodation at Belle Vue Villa, where they are recorded as living in the 1881 Census. The owners of Belle Vue Villa were the young Mr. and Mrs. Packwood, and their paternal grandmother. There were two other lodgers, besides the Chennells, an Edgar Page and his slightly older wife, Emily. A young servant, Georgiana Hall, aged 15, helped with the housework.

The Chennells sisters would most likely have led the somewhat retired life of many such retired “gentlewomen” of the day. They were both described as “annuitants” – presumably meaning that Ellen, at least, lived on the income from her Egyptian Bonds.

Anne Lydia died in 1885, aged about 73, and Ellen, presumably needing only a smaller space to live, moved to her last address, 7 Rodney Terrace Cheltenham. Rodney Terrace is a row of modest 19th Century houses, in the town centre. The houses are all now converted into offices, and have been re-numbered, making it difficult to tell which had been No. 7.

Rodney Terrace, Cheltenham

Here Ellen lived with the Dudge family, Charles, aged 46 in 1891, his wife Elizabeth, 42, and one son, Edward, aged 15. Presumably Edward was merely the only child still living at home at this time. There was another lodger apart from Ellen, Emma Ferris aged 58. There was also a servant, Alma Habits, aged 17.

This photo shows the house that may have been number 7. (It depends on which end of the row you start counting from). In any case, all the houses in the Terrace are identical in size and appearance.

So as you can see, Ellen would have had only modestly sized accommodation, although the house is conveniently placed and no doubt was reasonably comfortable. I wonder if Ellen dreamed there of the time when she had lived in palaces, as the companion of a Princess? Certainly she seems to have always been proud of having once been Princess Zeynab’s governess, as a special mention of it was made in the short notice of her death in the local newspaper.

Ellen died on 13th November 1896. The details on her death-certificate are as follows:

“Registration District Cheltenham. 1896 Death in the Sub-district of Cheltenham in the County of Gloucester.
No. 6.
When and where died: 13th November 1896. 7 Rodney Terrace.
Name and surname: Ellen Mary Chennells
Sex: Female
Age: 82 years
Occupation: Annuitant
Cause of death: Bronchitis & congestion of lungs 9 days. Dilation of heart of long standing. Certified by J.C. Gooding, M.D.
Signature, description and residence of informant: Elizabeth Dudge, present at the death, 7 Rodney Terrace Cheltenham.
When registered: 16th November 1896.
Signature of Reigstrar: J. A. Round, Interim Registrar.”

Presumably she would have been buried, with her sister, in the Cheltenham Cemetery, which is rather delightfully situated beneath Cleeve Hill, one of the Cotswolds. Unfortunately her grave is not listed amongst the Cemetery’s “Graves of Interest”, but who knows, maybe that may one day change (proposals could be sent to Cheltenham Borough Council). Incidentally Brian Jones, a member of the “Rolling Stones” pop-group is buried in the same cemetery.

I have not yet tried to locate her grave, but hope to do so in future. And by the way, if anyone visits Cheltenham in search of Ellen, spa-water, horse-racing, lovely Georgian architecture, the Cotswolds, or even some interesting frock-shops(!), and does visit her grave, I’d love to see a photo, or hear what you may have found out. Cheltenham is easily reachable from London or Birmingham by coach and car, or even by rail, although the station seems to be a bit inconveniently far from the middle of the town.

The notice of her death in the Cheltenham Examiner for Wednesday, 18 November 1896 reads:

“CHENNELLS – November 13, at 7, Rodney-Terrace, Eleanor Mary Chennells, formerly Governess of the Khedive’s family – aged 82 years.”

But now let us return to happier times, when Ellen was in Egypt…

To be continued.

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-09-28T06:15:00.000-07:00

ELLEN CHENNELLS (Ca. 1814-1896)

Introduction and early life
Coincidentally, at the same time as the height of Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay’s archaeological success, in 1896, a woman of a previous generation of western female involvement with Egypt was approaching the end of her life.

Her name was Eleanor Mary "Ellen" Chennells, and, as the culmination of a long career she had been appointed as Governess to Princess Zeynab Khanum Effendi, daughter of Ismail Pasha, Khedive of Egypt and his second wife, Princess Jananyar Berinici Khanum Effendimiz. And she had written a book about her experiences, Recollections of an Egyptian Princess by her English governess, that is now one of the classic sources of information about the Khedival court at an important phase in modern Egyptian history.

Curiously, the first 35 or so years of Ellen’s life are something of a mystery. There are no certain references to her in any Census before 1851 (although there is an inconclusive reference to an "Ellen Channells" [sic] in the 1841 Census, who has approximately the right birth-date). This may suggest that she, and her family, went to live abroad sometime after 1814 – there is a reference in Ellen’s book to residence in Malta.

Records are even unclear about exactly when she was born; the 1851 Census states that it was in "about 1819" and even, in the 1871 Scotland Census, that it was in "about 1820". However, the most reliable sources, e.g. her death certificate, as well as other Censuses, give her birthdate as around 1814 or 1815.

She always stated that her birthplace was Bloomsbury, London, in around 1814. However, although the UK Censuses, and Death Certificates usually give the name of a person’s parents, Ellen’s were, for some unknown reason, never listed. (I guess some more research in to any Bloomsbury parish records that survive may produce further details).

A part of Bloomsbury, London, around the time of Ellen's birth

But why did Ellen never reveal who here parents were? It could not, surely, have been due to any scandal. After all, she lived during the high Victorian era, and any hint of something improper would have meant that Ellen, in particular, would never have been employed, certainly by the kind of families that she did work for. What’s more, Ellen always seems to have had the kind of social confidence that was so obviously lacking in one of her predecessors as Governess to the Khedival family, the mysterious Emmeline Lott (fl. ca. 1865).

(A blog posting about Emmeline Lott, by the way, would be extremely short – the absence of information about her is almost complete, to the extent that some form of deliberate concealment has to be suspected).

The only definitely known fact about Ellen’s family is that she had an older sister, Anne Lydia (ca. 1812 – 1885). In 1841 Anne Lydia was recorded in the Census as working in a girls’ boarding-school on the Isle of Wight. She may indeed have been co-owner of this school, as she and a certain Ann Purks are the oldest (both aged 25), of a group of girls and young women, none of the rest of whom are listed as being older than 15. Towards the end of her life she lived with Ellen, in lodgings.

(Strangely, although Anne Lydia is mentioned in this Census, Ellen is not. So if the family were indeed living abroad, it might suggest that Ellen had not yet moved back to the UK).

Unfortunately I don’t even know what Ellen looked like, having been unable to trace any photos of her. Modesty, perhaps, prevented her from including a photo of herself in her book – but how lovely it would have been if she had!

This photo is of a woman in the 1860s who appears to be of approximately Ellen’s age during that decade, and may give some impression of what she might have looked like at the time.

Woman in clothing of 1860s

The first definite trace that I can find of Ellen is in the 1851 UK Census. Evidently, therefore, she was living abroad before this (in Malta?) The 1851 Census records her as governess to the two young daughters of the Hughan family, Wilhelmine and Louise. Their mother seems to have died, as the only other female Hughan listed is evidently their grandmother, given her age. The Hughans lived in a rather expensive area of London, Hanover Square, a Regency development that had been built in what was then the suburbs of London.

And this, then, starts to give us a picture of the Chennells sisters. Both had been born in a good-class area of central London, Bloomsbury (an area of London which was to attract writers, universities and museums). Both had enough money – and social contacts – to either set up their own school, or to work for upper-class (even, later on, Royal) families. Both were able to invest consideraby – but unfortunately somewhat unwisely - in bonds. They had to work for a living, but do not appear to have led the somewhat wretched lives of many other governesses of the period, as depicted in the writings of, e.g., Charlotte Brontë.

That both the Chennells sisters earned their livings as teachers, or governesses, is explained by the fact that this was, at the time, just about the only form of employment for women of their social class. Women’s role in society had been continually restricted since the end of the 18th century, narrowing the range of "respectable" work available to them. Technological inventions such as the typewriter and telegraph, which provided so much work for women later in the century were still some way in the future.

Ellen’s next known employment was with a far more important family; in the 1861 Census we find her employed by John Rous, the Second Earl of Stradbroke and sometime Lord Lieutenant of Suffolk, at his seat, Henham Park in Suffolk, England. (His descendants now live in Australia). It would seem her charges were the Earl’s two youngest daughters, Augusta Fanny and Sophia Evelyn Rous.

The Earl’s brother, the Hon. Henry Rous, was an Admiral in the British Royal Navy, and this, just possibly, may have provided Ellen with the introductions for her next post, as Governess to Sir Alexander Milne, First Lord of the Admiralty from 1872 to 1876 and Admiral of the Fleet from 1881.

Sir Alexander came from an already distinguished Naval family - his father had also been an Admiral – and in fact become one of the most notable figures in the Victorian Navy. He was rewarded with his Baronetcy in 1876.

Ellen lived with the Milnes at their home, Walne Lodge, Inveresk, Midlothian, Scotland, where she is recorded in the 1871 Scotland Census, evidently looking after Margaret Milne, then aged 12, and Grace Milne, 10.

Ellen herself was aged 56, and might well have been expected to be thinking about retirement. Certainly working in the different climate and culture of Egypt might have been something of a physical challenge.

And yet, later in 1871, she was to accept the post of Governess to Princess Zeynab. No doubt she felt that it was simply too good an opportunity to pass up. Besides, in only a few years the Milne daughters would reach the age when they no longer required a governess, and then Ellen would have had to seek new employment in any case.

Princess Zeynab, ca. 1870

Certainly she herself must have believed herself – at least at first - equal to the physical demands Egypt. And indeed, it was, indeed, to prove somewhat physically demanding on occasion; Ellen describes how, in 1871, Zeynab "suddenly disappeared down the opening [of the Third Pyramid] with surprising alacrity. Of course we all followed immediately… You were always going up, or down and generally on all-fours…" What made things worse was that Ellen was wearing a "crinoline and fashionable high bonnet".

(I can tell you from personal experience that even now going into the Third Pyramid is pretty strenuous, even in modern hiking boots and clothing!)

But how did she obtain such an important post? Certainly she would have been able to provide the very best references. And the Khedival family had, it seems, long employed British tutors for their children. Emmeline Lott suggests that she had been recruited by "The Viceroy’s [i.e. the Khedive Ismael’s] agent in London", who then, somewhat curiously, passed her onto the Alexandria, Egypt, branch of a bank.

However, Ellen gives no clue as to how her employment with the Khedive was arranged, although I would expect that the Ottoman Embassy in London was involved. (Egypt was then part of the Ottoman Empire; this is why Emmeline Lott states that Ishmael was a "Viceroy", although in fact the position of the Egyptian Khedive was somewhat more powerful than this, at the time). In any case, Ellen’s employer at the time, Sir Alexander Milne, would of course have been in an excellent situation to recommend her.

However, Ellen was in no hurry to accept even such a prestigious post. She wrote in her memoirs, Recollections of an Egyptian Princess by her English Governess (published by William Blackwood and Sons, 1893) that: "it was the beginning of quite a new life, and I was anxious to obtain every possible information before undertaking the duty."

No doubt she had Emmeline Lott’s books in mind. Not only do these – at least on the cover – present a somewhat sensationalist picture of "The English governess in Egypt and Turkey", with an emphasis on harems, but Emmeline Lott also complained – at considerable length – about the conditions she worked under.

Emmeline Lott(?) in Ottoman dress, ca. 1867

However, times had changed since Emmeline Lott had been employed. Furthermore, Ellen was obviously a practical and adaptable individual, who coped with difficulties and inconveniences in a far less uncomplaining way than Emmeline Lott.

Indeed, had not Princess Zeynab unfortunately died in 1875, then Ellen would have remained a part of her household. Certainly Ellen, unlike Emmeline Lott, had experience of life outside Britain, as she states in Recollections of an Egyptian Princess that she ‘had always been in the habit of keeping a journal when travelling or residing in foreign countries.’

The families that she worked for would have travelled, certainly to the watering-places of Europe, and as governess she would have accompanied them. They may even have spent considerable periods abroad, between the annual London "seasons". If only Ellen’s journals had survived! How interesting they would now be! And of course, they would also solve the mystery as to which country or countries she resided in.

To be continued...

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-09-27T03:51:00.000-07:00

Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay - concluded

The 1896 season
The following year the expedition’s work-force was increased in number, employing from eight to twelve men, twenty-four to thirty-six boys, guards, a water-carrier and of course a reis.

They were learning fast; it’s hard to believe that Maggie, at least, did not study archaeology during the summer, if only learning from her brother Fred. They certainly read fairly widely about Egypt and Egyptian history, including books by Amelia Edwards, Petrie, Naville, and a Professor Wiedemann. They also realised that they needed more help on site.

They state that they had been assisted in some way during their first season by a Miss Katharine Gent, possibly a friend. For their second and third seasons they obtained the help of a Colonel Esdaile, the husband of one of Maggie’s cousins, in supervising their workmen.

Anyway, having more-or-less excavated the first court of the temple the year before, the expedition then turned its attention to the pylon beyond it. This presented them with their first real archaeological challenge.

Of course we need to remember the circumstances that they were working under; they were not excavating a structure, as such, but mounds of sand and gravel, below which fragments of foundation survived. What was more, the site had been rebuilt several times.

This picture of the site, taken just before the present Johns Hopkins and Museum of Brooklyn excavations started, give some idea of what Maggie and Nettie faced:

They had started out in a comparatively straightforward part of the site, which had besides already been investigated, if only ineptly, by Mariette. But at this point they came to one of those parts of the dig that are all too familiar to archaeologists, where it seems as if every succeeding century has, higgeldy-piggeldy, added and demolished something.

They described the wall in which the gateway was set as a "composite structure", as the eastern section was not keyed into the pylon, as it would have been if built at the same time as the pylon. Furthermore, parts of the wall were obviously built in different ways, at different times. The wall to the west of the pylon was "completely destroyed". They describe that they "found here the remains of more than one row of hollow pots, which may have been used as air-bricks in some later rebuilding. But it is probable that the western side of the pylon was on the same plan as the eastern side at present."

In fact they were misled; the pots had simply been stored there at some time, in space hollowed out of the mud-brick infill of the temple wall at some time.

To begin with, the excavation found fragments of statues, including one bearing the (then) "very rare" cartouche of Tutankhamun, as well as a number of what they termed "Piankhŷ blocks", which were believed at the time to depict an expedition "to some country to the south of Egypt", led by a certain Piankhy, which had brought back many precious goods.

One of the "Piankhy Blocks"

"Piankhy blocks" are now known to be in fact carvings showing the arrival at Karnak of Nitocris, later the God’s Wife of Amun, Nitocris I (reigned ca. 655-584 BCE), accompanied by a powerful military force transported on ships, in ca. 654-656 BCE (sources vary as to the precise date).

Nitocris was the daughter of Psammetichus (Psammetik) I, the Persian vassal ruler of Egypt, who by sending both force and, it seems, considerable amounts of valuable items, forced the reigning God’s Wife, the Kushite Shepenupet II, to adopt her as her successor. This is seen as marking the end of Kushite (i.e. Nubian) influence in Egypt, following the XXVth "Kushite" Dynasty. Until that point Thebes had still regarded itself as a Kushite vassal city.

The expedition had problems with salts damaging pottery and statuary – salt has since become a huge and extremely serious problem at not only Karnak but other sites – which they managed to control by soaking items in water.

In fact in one interesting passage they reveal that De Morgan once had had a scheme for flooding the entire Karnak site, using the water that he thought flowed from the Nile into the sacred lakes. However - unsurprisingly - "the practical difficulties were so great… that it was never carried out."

Still in search of foundation-deposits, they dug at the eastern corner of the wall, a likely spot for them. Although they did not find foundation-deposits, they did find a great number of statues, which they believed were deliberately buried there. (Indeed, sometimes temples did have a "clear-out" of statues, which they buried in the temple grounds").

In the search for foundation-deposits they made excavations at points around all the walls of the Temple; they were also to do this during the following year. And it was whilst doing so they found a tiny underground room, which they described inaccurately as a "crypt", at the lake end of the Temple.

It seems very significant of their state of mind that, on finding a hole leading from this, they jumped to the conclusion that it was a "treasure-chamber". At the back of how many minds over the years has been that gleam of gold everywhere which Howard Carter described when first looking in to King Tut’s tomb, more than 20 years later!

Excited, they took elaborate precautions overnight, spreading sand, in which they wrote their initials, around the entrance, and placing an armed guard in front. And then came disappointment; the "treasure-chamber" only contained a few fragments of ancient rubbish!

The 'Treasure-Chamber" as it appears now

Maggie and Nettie – like other Egyptologists of the time - had to learn fast on the job, not least how to cope with overbearing officials, who were possibly motivated by the Anglo-French rivalry noted above.

At this time the rest of the Precinct of Amun at Karnak was being excavated by the French-run Antiquities Service, work being directed by a M. Legrain. In early February 1896, Legrain descended on the Temple of Mut, and demanded that all the various pieces of statuary that had been discovered there, which were being kept by the expedition at the Luxor Hotel, should be taken to the Antiquities Service magazine at Karnak. Not only would this deprive Maggie and Nettie of the pleasure at being able to look at what they had found, but would have also prevented the pieces from being photographed, drawn, and described by presumably not only Maggie and Nettie, but other Egyptologists, too.

Maggie described in a letter to her mother what happened. "I very nearly wept, and called Fred [her brother], who was slightly rude. M. Legrain became much more polite and finally said that if we chose to take the whole responsibility of their safety, we could take them back…"

They chose the last week of February to close the dig on, and were intending to travel to Cairo, and then home, during the first week of March. They therefore ceased to employ a number of the boys. One of these, however, still hanging around the site, was to make a significant discovery at the rear, southern, end of the temple on the bank sloping down to the lake. Investigating a half-buried block of stone that had been thought of no importance, he felt a carved foot underneath.

The expedition worked hard to excavate this statue before sunset, as it was Ramadan. They managed it, and found that it was a rare (for the site) complete statue, with another statue buried beneath it. They left two armed guards to protect it overnight (a by no means unreasonable precaution, in fact), and the next morning found Percy Newberry already examining the statue. He was able to reveal to them that it was of Senmut, an official to Queen Hatshepsut; later he was to be revealed as the architect of the Temple.

Legrain by this time seems to have been more co-operative, as he helped the expedition, together with a Mr. Dixon of the Land Taxing Commission at Luxor, to move the statues up the bank.

As a slightly hurried end to their season, Maggie and Nettie decided to "cut down" the southern bank of the lake, in the hope of finding more, and a remarkable photo was taken of them doing this.

Maggie or Nettie supervises work on the southern bank; photo by Nettie's father

Although their contract with the Antiquities Service had specified that their finds were sent to the Cairo Museum, it was however customary for expeditions to be allowed to keep certain duplicate items for themselves (in fact this was still allowed up to the mid 1980s). Unfortunately, Egypt has occasionally lost some valuable antiquities in this way, sometimes through dishonest behaviour on the part of the excavator, as was the case with the famous head of Nefertiti, or simply through a misunderstanding of what the item actually was.

And so, the Antiquities Service let Maggie and Nettie keep the head of a God, thought to be Min, a statue of Ramesses II, and the head of a statue of Ramesses III.

The "Million Dollar" head of Amun

However, the head of "Min" was, much later, found to in fact be the head of Amun, and was one of only two that have ever been discovered. It was sold in 1991 at Christies for no less than £572,000 (the equivalent of approximately $1 million at the time)!

This was by no means all. The expedition was also given a 26th Dynasty statue of Ser, a son of a pharaoh, which was sold in 1977 for $190,000.

Ironically, then, their treasure turned out to be not in their imagined "treasure-chamber" (most likely in fact a store for sacred vessels), but the "duplicate" statuary that they were given.

The season’s excavation had been a success. Much had been found and done, and accurate plans of the temple continued to be drawn. What was more, it had improved Maggie’s always delicate health. Fred wrote in February 1896 that: "Maggie is so much better; doesn’t get tired and was so lively the other night at dinner with the Whites and Lady Galloway, that I don’t think you would have known your own daughter. I think the winter has just crystallized all the cure set up before."

So far, so very good, then. However, in October 1896 Archbishop Benson died suddenly – appropriately, perhaps, during a church-service - whilst visiting the Gladstones at their home, Hawarden.

Maggie had always been close to her father, and it is possible that in some way his death may have contributed, if only indirectly, to her later mental illness. However, for the moment, continuing the excavations in 1897 was the perfect reason for a Benson family holiday in the country, and so Maggie, her mother Mary, and her brothers Fred and Hugh (who was later to convert to Roman Catholicism) set off for Luxor together.

The Benson and Gourlay expedition was by now well-established, and was determined to do even better this time. They sought funds, and help with supervision, and employed "over eighty boys and sixteen or seventeen men" (presumably including the reis) and plus a water-carrier. The need for site security also increased, as more finds were made.

They now knew what to expect, and this allowed them to set firm aims – to continue uncovering, and making an accurate plan of the temple, to continue searching for the important foundation-deposits that would allow them to date it, and – after the previous year – to try to find more statues. They also had a good idea of the precise points they wished to excavate.

Workmen were hired on January 9, 1897. To make the most of the time available they started the very next day, even before they could be fully supervised. They instantly made a discovery, and sent a message to Maggie and Nettie, who came as quickly as they could to the Temple. The discovery was of parts of two block statues, the head of one and the body of another, of the Fourth Prophet of Amun, Mentuemhat, dating from around the 25th – 26th Dynasties, at the south-east corner of the temple.

The head of Mentuemhat

It was an important find; in fact the head is one of the great works of Egyptian portraiture. This alone would have made the entire season a success, and so we can imagine that everything must have looked extremely promising indeed to Maggie and Nettie. Indeed, it can only make us wonder just what might have been were they able to continue; indeed, how it all might have come to affect the history of Egyptology itself.

Certainly it seemed that Nettie’s career had been well-launched; indeed, she and Percy Newberry were to work together on the inscriptions of the Mentuemhat statue, later jointly publishing a paper about it, in a French scholarly journal, Recueil de Travaux (Vol. XX, 1898) .

Indeed, had she lived now she could undoubtedly have expected a bright future in the profession. Then, however, it was still difficult for a woman to make a career on her own; most women of the time were able to do so because they married other Egyptologists.

In fact by this time we can get something of a picture of the roles that the two women had. Maggie, the more outgoing one, the administrator and organiser; her family’s excellent connections had been vital. The rather shy Nettie, on the other hand, seems to have taken on the role of the expedition’s Egyptologist and scholar, working with Percy Newberry on deciphering the inscriptions that would make sense of the finds. Indeed, Maggie was to write some years later that "I always wanted her [i.e Nettie] to do the Egyptology." Both roles were key, and the fact that they could be filled no doubt added to the expedition’s remarkable success.

The Ptolemaic Shrine at the rear of the temple during the dig

The expedition now, unsurprisingly, concentrated its effort around the rear, southern wall of the Temple, an area that contained a Ptolemaic era shrine. And yet again they found large numbers of statues. On the first day alone, they record, they found fourteen pieces of statue, including a Saite period head, which they believed to be female, but which is now known to be in fact of a man.

The Saite Head

They also found a pot containing forty-nine Greek coins from the reign of Nero.

Their aim was also conservation, and as they had during the previous season tried to replace stonework in what they believed to be its original position, and to repair statues.

It was, archaeologically, an outstanding season, and they certainly intended to return the next year. Nettie wrote to Percy Newberry saying that they were planning to build an excavation-house on the site, for storage and accommodation. They also tentatively planned to dredge the Lake for objects (this in fact was not done until this year, 2008).

But unfortunately it was all never to be, as Maggie’s health was soon to seriously break down, to the extent that her life was threatened.

A previous posting in this series has related how most of the Bensons were taken ill a at the same time. Maggie at first had little more than a chill. This may have turned in to pneumonia, as pleurisy followed. An emergency operation took place in her hotel room to drain the fluid around her lungs was drained by a doctor. She survived this only to suffer a heart-attack; her brother Arthur was later to write that "her recovery was thought impossible, her death being for an hour momentarily expected."

The family had to remain in Luxor until June, with the Luxor Hotel being kept open especially for them "at much expense after all [other] visitors had departed."

The 1900 trip to Egypt
In fact even after the publication of The Temple of Mut in Asher, Maggie’s career in Egyptology was not quite over.

In 1900-1901, Maggie and Nettie, together with "Aunt Nora" – a Mrs. Sidgwick, who was the elder sister of British politician Arthur Balfour - were to visit Egypt again, and stayed with Newberry in his rented house on the West Bank at Luxor.

(Coincidentally they were to make a torch-light visit to the Valley of the Kings on the same evening that the news of the death of Queen Victoria. Like so many other Victorians, Maggie realised that it was the passing of an age).

It has long been thought that they were travelling merely as tourists. However, the Egyptologist Herbert Winlock, writing much later about a bowl found by Newberry at this time, mentioned that Newberry had said in a letter to Theodore Davis (see below) that: "My friends Miss Benson and Miss Gourlay are going to join me at Thebes where we intend to work together."

Plainly the trip must have been arranged with Newberry, as they stayed at his house. But had, in fact, Maggie and Nettie actually decided to work with him?

Maggie put it this way: "Our plans both for Egyptology and travelling must seem rather like the ‘glittering chameleon.’ Here is a new departure, the most definite thing, in a sense, that has yet turned up. Mr. Newberry has been planning to write a history of Egypt - a big history and a standard one – to be more complete, but especially more literary than Petrie’s. It appears that he approves of my literary (!) powers, and he has asked me [and presumably also Nettie?] to help him. He is going to try to get his American millionaire to finance the work…"

The "American millionaire" was Theodore Davis, who was to finance a number of archaeologists working in the Theban area. He is best known for his attempts to fully excavate the Valley of the Kings. In 1900, the year of Maggie and Nettie’s visit, Davis had given Newberry £250, to excavate Theban Tomb 100, made for an Eyptian called Rekhmire, as well as ten other tombs in the area of Abd el-Qurna village.

Newberry expected that the book would take two years to write, and it would involve Maggie visiting museums in Britain and in Europe. She was also busy at the time with editing a book of sermons by her father. What was more, she (at least by now) seems to have been in two minds about Egyptology, writing that "I can’t feel that Egyptology is the thing most worth doing in the world, though I feel that about most other things while I’m doing them… things… like Egyptology, opened just when I could do nothing else."

However, Percy Newberry made it clear that what he valued above all was Maggie’s literary style. After all, she had written several, quite popular books. And in fact her writing-style is very good; she could avoid the stiff, wordy Victorian style, when necessary; her communication-skills were undoubtedly excellent. (And it does raise the question whether Newberry hoped for her help in getting funds from Davis).

Newberry did not press her for an answer, allowing her time to think it over, but she obviously declined, in the end. Still, she seems to have at least seriously considered the proposal, even seemingly changing her travel-plans when journeying back to England in order to travel up through Italy to "See the museums there".

It is a great pity that, in the end, she did not write the book. Despite her beliefs that Nettie was the Egyptologist, rather than her, she had exactly the sort of questioning, analytical mind and methodical approach, able to learn from mistakes and experience, that is needed. And furthermore, there is no doubt that she had great intelligence; it was often said at the time that if she had been allowed to read for a degree at Oxford she would have obtained one.

Consider, for example, her approach to Egyptian religion, a subject which it is plain from The Temple of Mut in Asher fascinated her. She was to write when seeing the ritual texts on the walls of tombs in the Valley of the Kings that "I wish one could work out this religion question". She criticises the standard guide-book of the day, Baedecker, for its inadequate descriptions of the scenes, writing that it "sounds like Lear’s Nonsense Book!"

Given that she was the daughter of a Victorian Archbishop of Canterbury, she might well have taken the opinion that Egyptian religion was all simply "nonsense." But on the contrary, she understood that all religions have far more in common than their practitioners would often like to admit. Brought up amongst cathedrals, she seems to have had an inner understanding of what made the essential nature of all religion.

‘A hope deferred, but sure’
More and more, the Egyptological work of Maggie and Nettie is being appreciated, in an age when women’s achievement can be recognised. They appear on lists of famous Egyptologists; they have Wikipedia entries, and other internet sites about them.

And yet, how much more there could have been! Had Maggie not fallen so ill… had the expedition continued (as it fully intended to do)… had the Benson and Gourlay team (for it would surely have been something of a joint effort) gone on to write Percy Newberry’s book… had, simply, the abilities of women been more fully recognised at the time!

However their work has been carried on at the "Temple of Mut in Asher". Brooklyn Museum and Johns Hopkins University carry on the work there, under the supervision of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities, and perhaps, if you seek the epitaph of Maggie and Nettie as Egyptologists, it with the carrying on of the work they started.

Large statue of Sekhmet at the Temple

‘Over all the temple, from where the Goddess guardians sit above the steps down which priests once carried the sacred bark, and where kings burned frankincense before the emblem of the god, to where the sphinx head still smiles out of the dust of the centuries, lies that air of expectation, still and assured, which so inspires the remains of that people, who built not for time but for eternity. All through the land the spirit of the race prisoned in stone lives in grave figures which wait through immeasurable years for a hope deferred, but sure, looking with level eyes into a distance between earthly horizons, as those that watch in the darkness before dawn, for the far-off sunrise which brings in an everlasting day.’

Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay, The Temple of Mut in Asher, Chapter V, pp. 78-79.

The Temple of Mut in Asher

Recollections of Eyptian Princesses

2008-09-24T14:51:00.000-07:00

Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay (Continued)

Two women at the Temple of Mut, 1898; drawing by C. D. Gibson

The partnership with Nettie
Who introduced Margaret to Nettie Gourlay? This is intriguing. As Nettie had been one of Petrie’s pupils, then it may have been Petrie. But of all his current and past female pupils, did he propose Nettie? Did he, just possibly, gain some insight into the two women's nature?

It is possible that the introduction may have been made by Lady Jane Lindsay, a family friend; Maggie's account is somewhat ambiguous. She wrote her mother on January 31, 1896, from "Mut" (evidently the Temple itself, as she describes hiring workmen in the letter): "Yesterday morning Jeanie [Lady Lindsay] came with me, and a Miss Gourlay who is going to help…"

This gives too little information. Would it be reading too much into a probably hastily scribbled note to note a difference between "who is going to help" and "who I have asked to help"? In other words, was Nettie, a trained Egyptologist, merely someone who Maggie was told that she needed? The fact that they later became such close friends being coincidence?

Certainly they do not appear to have been close friends at first. It was not until almost a month later, on February 23, that Maggie wrote her mother that: "I found unexpectedly that Miss Gourlay shared my sentiments about [the author Robert Louis] Stevenson… I like her extremely; not the least - not the slightest touch of Schwärmerei [enthusisam] but through interested liking."

Evidently she needed to make it clear to her openly lesbian mother that it was not – yet – Schwärmerei. But it seems to have been by at least May 15, when she wrote her mother again (from Aix-en-Provence, France): "I like her [i.e. Nettie] more and more – I haven’t liked any one so well for years." Interestingly, this letter indicated that Nettie suffered from depression: "I never knew of any one [i.e. Nettie] whose theory of life so disregarded enjoyment – too much I think – and though I don’t suppose she is happy, you couldn’t call her unhappy because in a sense, she is bigger than that."

From the letters it is clear that the time they spent together in Aix, on their way home from Egypt, confirmed their friendship. From then on, every letter Maggie sent to her mother mentions Nettie, and with increasing Schwärmerei. The published letters that she sent to Nettie herself, although carefully chosen and heavily edited, are, quite frankly, love-letters.

The excavation’s first season, 1895

The first court of the Temple of Mut during the excavation

But back to the excavation at Mut. For Maggie, at least, it seems to have been largely a case of learning on the job. To begin her excavations in 1895, she followed a map of the Temple published by Aguste Mariette in 1875 in his book Karnak: étude topographique et archéologique.

Mariette is best known today for his discovery of the Serapeum at Saqquara, and for writing the plot of the opera Aida. Little more than a looter, he is notorious for using dynamite in his operations, resulting in massive destruction of monuments. His map, unsurprisingly, quickly proved to be inaccurate. However, its existence does once again throw doubt on Maggie’s statement that it was unlikely that anyone believed there were no discoveries to be made at the site.

First Gateway of the Temple during the excavation

She began work on January 1, 1895, for a period of five weeks, with four men, sixteen boys and a girl water-carrier, under the control of a reis (foreman), as well as a night-watchman. Supervising them was not easy for her at first, especially as she knew very little Arabic, and had to use a donkey-boy as an interpreter. She felt, indeed, that her main role was to simply pay the workmen.

The wages she paid were 2 piastres, which she said was the equivalent of 5d. (old money) for men, 1½ piastres for boys, per ten hour working day. She claimed that this was the equivalent in purchasing power to the then current British agricultural wage of half a crown a day. (A roughly contemporary rate of exchange gave 97½ piastres to a British pound).

It had become the practice for Egyptologists to pay the workmen baksheesh for any finds made, partly to encourage them to report, rather than conceal and sell objects. But Margaret was not sure quite how much to pay. Flinders Petrie, at the Ramesseum, paid the full black market value of the object. The Antiquities Service work at nearby sites in Karnak, on the other hand, did not pay much baksheesh, increasing security instead. The EEF, at Deir el-Bahri, paid a day’s wages as baksheesh. Maggie and Nettie eventually followed Petrie’s idea, and "roughly proportioned the baksheesh to the value of the find and the opportunities for theft… for certain large finds we gave baksheesh to all the men." It seems to have generally worked; there was only one known theft from the site, of the head of a statue, in 1897.

However, they suspected that other thefts took place, and this did not improve their opinion of their workmen. Again, we have to remember that Margaret and Nettie were Victorians; they did not think like us. They held an attitude of imperialist superiority: "we realised" they wrote "that the Arabs were like naughty children", who had "singularly little method in their work".

On the other hand, they generally attempted to treat their workmen well, paying them themselves, to ensure that the right "proportion of the sum reaches the right person". They were in fact advised to do this, possibly by Flinders Petrie, who always did so. They also replaced any worn coins if asked.

Some of the excavation work took place during Ramadan, especially during the first season. Maggie thought that it was possible to prevent fasting during Ramadan, but did not do so, in order to allow the workmen to continue "such religious observances". (Maggie was genuinely interested in various theologies, writing approvingly about Ancient Egyptian religion). Instead, she allowed a two hour break at mid-day "without loss of wages" on Friday, the Moslem holy day, for the workmen to attend services at the Mosque. The workmen were also allowed "at their own request" to stop work an hour early on each day.

She struggled against ill-health (in fact she had come to Egypt in the first place to convalesce), theft, and the complete unfamiliarity of everything. None the less, she made good progress, going over the part of the temple that had been dug in by Mariette, and noting his errors.

Interesting finds turned up, in particular an important sitting block figure of a royal scribe of Amenhotep II (1427-1400 BCE), called Amenemhet (now in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo). She also found a statue of Sekhmet, and various other small pieces.

Statue of Amenhet, photos taken by Margaret and Nettie themselves.

Finally she undertook conservation-work, repairing some of the Sekhmet statues with plaster, and replacing them in what she thought was their original position.

One of her aims had been to ascertain the date of the foundation of the temple (The Temple of Mut describes how during the excavations they continually sought unsuccessfully for the "foundation deposits", which would have established this). Finally, she dated the temple on the evidence of the statue of Amenemhat being found without any debris being found between it and the floor of the temple. It was a reasonable assumption, based on stratigraphy, to make, especially for the time. However, in fact it would only, at best, provide a date for the last use of the Temple, and then only if the Temple had been a "sealed context", i.e. undisturbed since that time, which it was not.

In fact no harm was done; they were later to find out, following the discovery of another statue, that of Senmut, architect to Queen Hatshepsut Maatkare (1473-1458 BCE) (see below) that the temple was founded considerably earlier, during the reign of Hatshepsut. (In fact most of its construction took place under Amenhotep III Nebmaare [1390-1352 BCE]).

During all their stays at Luxor, Maggie and Nettie stayed at the Luxor Hotel, about a mile and a half away from the Temple. This was as convenient as they could get, although it did mean a donkey-ride commute each day. Besides, the Luxor Hotel certainly offered them the entertainment, and comfort that they could expect; on one occasion Maggie attended a fancy-dress ball there dressed as the Goddess Mut, even down to the Vulture head-dress, worn by all Queens and Goddesses who were mothers. Where she obtained the materials for this remains something of a mystery!

Maggie's brother Fred, incidentally, had also been busy with work of his own in Egypt. Not only had he helped at the Temple of Mut, but he also worked at Alexandria for the EEF, investigating the possibility of archaeological work there. (Some publications mistakenly say that he did this work for the Hellenistic Society).

The Book

The Temple of Mut in Asher was published by the old-established and highly-regarded firm of John Murray, London, in 1899. It is an attractive book, lavishly filled with photographic plates, and a fold-out plan of the Temple. A special hieroglyphic typeface was produced for Percy Newberry's section, which reproduced the hieroglyphs as they appeared, rather than to a standard shape, as now.

The cover design is simple, yet effective, and, interestingly, includes a small piece of Egyptological history in its own right - the drawing of the vulture is by a young Howard Carter, taken from the Shrine of Anubis at Deir el-Bahri.

And yet the book very nearly did not come about at all. Although Maggie enjoyed a reasonably successful, if short, first season, she did not propose to write an excavation-report. She intended to make a new plan of the Temple, and no more.

Indeed, she said in The Temple of Mut in Asher that she "began without any idea of publishing our [sic] work", and this is quite evident from the rather inadequate chapter on the 1895 season of work. Furthermore, she went on to say that she wished to continue without making records: "we began our second season in the same mind".

It should be pointed out, however, that Egyptologists were under no obligation to publish an excavation report (in fact even fairly recent excavations in Egypt have never published excavation reports). The Antiquities Service’s contract with her simply required her to send any portable finds to the Cairo Museum.

However, the second (1896) season was to see the arrival of Nettie Gourlay, no doubt full of Petrie’s urgings about publication. It is also likely that the various archaeologists working in Luxor attempted to persuade Maggie to keep at least basic notes. Yet even so, a publication such as The Temple of Mut in Asher still seems to have been far from Maggie’s mind. In the book she says that she simply wished to record what she was finding at Mut: "unexpected discoveries demanded publication, and the third year added more material". However, "Our idea [even] then was not so much to publish our undertaking as to preserve the names and histories that Egypt had committed to our charge. We intended therefore at first to put forth these results simply for the use of the expert".

Where, then, did the idea of The Temple of Mut in Asher come from? There is no doubt that Maggie, at least, would have been only too pleased to come up with something for a general readership; the Benson family were prolific writers, and Maggie was already a published – and indeed quite popular - author.

In its overall approach and style it seems to have been influenced by other "popular" Egyptological works of the time, such as Amelia Edwards’ Pharaohs, fellahs and explorers (1891), a work which Maggie and Nettie acknowledge that they had read. It also certainly filled a gap; there were so few books on the history of Ancient Egypt available at the time that in 1892 Flinders Petrie had regarded the writing of an up-to-date one for his students a priority. And as we shall see in due course, Maggie and Nettie were to be asked to help write a general history.

The Temple of Mut in Asher is a mixture of excavation-report and general history. Information about discoveries at the temple is scattered throughout the book, as illustrations of points of Egyptian history. This is frustrating for the modern reader, who would expect to read a general history and an excavation report separately, but would not necessarily be so for a contemporary audience; indeed something of the same approach was taken by Amelia Edwards in Pharaohs, fellahs and explorers.

And indeed, as at the time a background knowledge of Ancient Egypt would not be common, it can also be seen as an actual strength of the book in that it places the discoveries in their wider context. (In fact, truly a work of its time, it presupposes Biblical knowledge, but little Egyptological knowledge on the part of its readers).

Furthermore, the book is advanced for its time in giving a detailed site description, as well as (from 1896 onwards) an almost day-to-day account of the work that took place, including various anecdotes. It is, in fact, almost an early blog; and this approach is still used by the current excavators of the site, the Brooklyn Museum, who publish a weekly excavation blog about their ongoing work.

The Temple of Mut in Asher is divided up into five parts: "Introduction"; "History of the excavation"; "The religion of Egypt"; "History" [of Ancient Egypt]; and "Inscriptions". The last part, "Inscriptions", was written by Percy Newberry, and was plainly meant only for specialists.

In her Preface, Maggie described Newberry’s contribution as "the most essential part of the publication". Significantly, however, she crossed these words out in her own copy of the book.

Interestingly, in her own copy of the book, Maggie noted who wrote which chapters. She claimed sole authorship of chapters I-IV, VI-VIII, X, XII, and XIV. Nettie was the sole author of chapters IX, XI, XV, and XVI, which included a description of a statue of Mentuhemat that she and Newberry were later to publish a paper on (see below). Nettie was also the principal author, with Maggie’s help, of Chapter XIII. Maggie and Nettie wrote chapters V and XVII together.

Indeed, it is possible to notice the differences in Maggie’s and Nettie’s writing-style. Maggie’s is very much the rounded, descriptive style of the popular author, whilst Nettie has a somewhat drier, ‘academic’ style, tending to concentrate simply on facts.

A discussion of wages, prices, the value of labour, and the payment of baksheesh (tips) appears in the book. This was in fact one of Maggie's many iterests; four years previously she had published a work on economics titled Capital, Labour, and Trade.

A number of photographers are credited. Maggie and Nettie, as well as Nettie’s father took photos themselves. Others were taken by Emile Brugsch. Some were evidently taken by visiting academics, such as the Dr. Page May who is credited for several photos. The majority, however, were taken by a J.F. Vaughan, who may have had a photography business in Luxor. The quality of photos varies; Vaughan obviously used professional equipment, whilst Maggie and Nettie seems to have used their box-cameras.

They would certainly have been encouraged to use photography by Flinders Petrie, who had in fact been using it extensively during his excavations during the early 1880s.

Indeed, an interest of the book is that it shows how much photos were being used by archaeologists of the time. Brugsch was obviously a trained photographer, using such techniques as oblique lighting to reveal faint details. Several photographs are uncredited, and may have been taken by the Government Antiquities Service as a record, as they are plainly the work of trained photographers, using techniques such the use of three-quarter profiles of statues.

Unfortunately the book did not go beyond a single edition (though it may have had more than one printing, as on some books the vulture design appears in gold) although a facsimile edition is currently in print.

To be continued...

News from the Two Lands - shock horror crime special!

2008-09-24T05:56:00.000-07:00

Egypt donkey jailed for theft
5 days ago

CAIRO (AFP) — An Egyptian donkey has been jailed for stealing corn on the cob from a field belonging to an agricultural research institute in the Nile Delta, local media reported on Thursday.

The ass and its owner were apprehended at a police checkpoint that had been set up after the institute's director complained that someone was stealing his crops, the state-owned Al-Ahram daily said.

The unnamed ungulate was found in possession of the institute's corn and a local judge sentenced him to 24 hours in prison. The man who had his ass thrown in jail got off with a fine of 50 Egyptian pounds (nine dollars, six euros).

(Source: Egypt Daily News).

Hmm, we can only hope that the miscreant moke has now learned its lesson, and will not re-offend. But knowing Egyptian donkeys all too well, we are not at all sure of it!

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-09-21T12:42:00.000-07:00

Margaret Benson and Janet Gourlay - continued.

For a long time the Benson and Gourlay expedition tended to be disregarded. It was seen as little more than the temporary amusement of a wealthy and well-connected Victorian woman, achieving little in comparison with the professional - male - Egyptologists of the time.

More recently, however, it has been re-evaluated, and its – considerable – achievements are increasingly recognised. Rather than being just an amateur meddler, Maggie Benson can now be given her due credit as the nucleus around which a pioneering, and effective team was built.

It is, in fact, a remarkable story.

The Precinct of Mut

But firstly, where did it all take place? The Precinct of Mut is one of the self-contained religious areas (known as "Precincts") of the Karnak temple complex. Each of the three deities that made up the Theban Triad have a precinct at Karnak. The God Montu, the original deity of the region, has a small area and temple to the north of the main area, the Precinct of Amun. The Precinct of Mut, the Consort of Amun in Theban theology lies about 300 yards to the south, and was connected to the 10th Pylon of the Amun Temple by an avenue of sphinxes.

The Precinct of Mut is a comparatively poorly-preserved site, although an important one. It is not, at the moment, open to the public, though is to be in the future.

Most visitors to Karnak, herded in groups through the main Amun Temple then shooed around the giant scarab, will not venture south, through what seems to be no more than a huge stone-mason’s yard, in the half an hour or so that their tour-guide allows them to explore for themselves. And would probably be disappointed if they did so; even if they managed to get a glance through the boundary fences towards the area of the Precinct of Mut, several hundred yards distant, they would see little more than what appears to be a few overgrown mounds.

There would have been even less visible in the 19th century, apart from a huge number of half-buried statues of the lion-headed Goddess Sekhmet (an aspect of Mut, at Thebes). This old photo of the site, taken by the French photographer Henri Bechard, in the 1870s – 1880s shows an almost surreal landscape, with rows of statues emerging from the mounds. This would have been the appearance of the site when Margaret Benson first started work there.

The Precinct as a whole covers around twenty feddans (acres), and contains three temples and a large, horseshoe-shaped (though now partly silted) Sacred Lake, an important part of the worship of Mut. Sacred Lakes of Mut were called Isheru (transliterated as "Asheru" in the 19th century). That the name referred to a type of Sacred Lake rather than a specific area of Karnak was not understood in the 1890s, giving rise to the misunderstanding which led Maggie and Nettie to call their book The Temple of Mut in Asher.

The three temples in the Precinct are the Mut Temple, which was to be the main object of Maggie and Nettie’s work, the Temple of Khonsupakherod ("Khonsu the Child"), to the east, and a temple of unknown dedication, built by Ramesses III, to the south-west.

Little attention had been paid to the site before the Benson and Gourlay expedition. A plan of it had been drawn by the Savants who accompanied Bonaparte’s ill-fated military expedition to conquer Egypt in the late 18th century, and had been investigated by Lepsius’s royal Prussian expedition in the mid 1840s. But Maggie and Nettie were the first to make any significant excavations there. Indeed, the site was not excavated again until the 1920s.

However, since 1976, the situation has changed enormously, with excavation, conservation and research being undertaken by the Museum of Brooklyn and the Johns Hopkins University – who only this year, in fact, bravely undertook an unusual summer expedition, to investigate the lake. They publish the results of their excavations online, and give full acknowledgement to Maggie and Nettie.

It is unclear why Maggie chose to excavate the Temple of Mut. She herself claims in The Temple of Mut in Asher that: "there was something about the place so beautiful, even so romantic, that a suggestion casually made about digging in Egypt came to mind."

She also attempts to make light of her aims, stating that "our first intention was not ambitious. We were desirous of clearing a picturesque site. We were frankly warned that we should make no discoveries; indeed if any had been anticipated it was unlikely that the clearance would have been entrusted to inexperienced direction." (Note the use of the plural here is misleading, as Nettie Gourlay was not at this point involved). She declares herself surprised at the "unexpected discoveries" that she and Nettie made.

The Politics
She was not, however, being fully sincere. It’s plain from the Bechard photo alone that the site was obviously rich in antiquities. Indeed, there is an entire chapter of The Temple of Mut in Asher called "previous plans", which lists the work done there by earlier archaeologists and explorers. So it was fully evident that the site was important, even if little had been done there.

But why should she, of all people, a woman of exceptionally strong moral ideals, want to mislead? And the answer is, politics. We need to remember just who she was; the daughter of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Primate of All England, the highest ranking churchman and commoner in Britain and a member of the government. Her family were close friends of the Gladstones, the most famous of who was William Gladstone, one of the most outstanding and long-serving Prime Ministers of the Victorian era. Whatever she did, or wrote, or said, would not pass un-noticed, especially at a period when war with France threatened, following the Fashoda Incident.

Although Egypt had been under British occupation since 1882, parts of its administration, including the Antiquities Service (now the Supreme Council of Antiquities), were run by the French, who had previously been the main colonial power. The Director of Antiquities in 1895, when Margaret commenced work, was M. Jaques de Morgan (Antiquities Director 1892-1897).

It was a very uneasy time in Anglo-French relationships. As one book says: "During these years… Anglo-French imperial rivalry ran rampant, culminating in the showdown at Fashoda on the Sudan in 1898."

At this point, I need to explain the Fashoda Incident, a temper-tantrum of the imperialistic mindset. A French force had occupied the small Sudanese town of Fashoda, with the intention of adding the Sudan to the French Empire. A larger British force sailed up the Nile to confront them, with the intention of instead adding the Sudan to the British Empire, and allowing the map to be printed red from Uganda to the Mediterranean. Outnumbered, the French force were obliged to withdraw from Fashoda, but then followed a lot of blustering, threatening and general posturing between the French and British governments. However, neither side could hope to win a war; the French army was larger than the British, yet the British fleet larger than the French, resulting (fortunately) in stalemate. Besides, both countries soon realised that there was a greater threat to both of them – Germany – and so eventually calmed down and made friends.

The Fashoda Incident took place only the year before The Temple of Mut in Asher was published. Therefore, with Franco-British ill-feeling still at its height, M. de Morgan might have been heavily criticised at home for having given permission for an amateur Englishwoman to excavate an important site under his protection. So Maggie had to be careful for his sake what she wrote about how he came to his decision.

According to her account in The Temple of Mut, de Morgan initially refused her application to excavate, but was persuaded to change his mind by the intervention of the famous Swiss archaeologist, Eduard Naville, who was at that time excavating the Hatshepsut Temple at Deir el-Bahri, on the West Bank at Luxor.

But did she perhaps over-emphasise his initial refusal of her application to excavate? Given that he approved the excavation as soon as Naville supported her application, did he merely insist that it was supervised by a competent archaeologist? It seems possible, as in The Temple of Mut in Asher we are told that in 1895, when Maggie was beginning her excavation "M. Naville had been with us [i.e. at the time Maggie alone] a day or two previously, to interview our overseer and to show us how to determine our course of work"

However, we need to ask why Naville supported her application. I shall return to that question below.

Maggie and Nettie were in any case very diplomatically careful to give effusive thanks in their book to both de Morgan, and M. Georges Daressy, the Secretary General of the Antiquities Service.

They also acknowledge help from other distinguished archaeologists. These included Emile Brugsch, (also known as "Brugsch Bey", from an Egyptian title that he held), who was the discoverer of an important "mummy cache" near Luxor, and who was to have a long career in the Egyptian museums service. There was also Ludwig Borchart, then Cultural Attaché of the German Embassy, who later, as Director of the German Archaeological Institute, was to gain notoriety for removing the famous head of Nefertiti to Berlin.

And of course there was Flinders Petrie. At the time Petrie was working nearby, at the Ramesseum, and is acknowledged by Maggie and Nettie as having made "important and most helpful suggestions". Indeed, it’s possible that he may have been responsible for recommending, if not actually introducing Nettie to Maggie Benson. Nettie had been one of his first students at University College London following his acceptance of the Chair of Egyptian Archaeology and Philology in 1892.

In fact most of Flinders Petrie’s first students were women. And what was more, in a spirit of equal opportunities that was almost unique at the time, he encouraged his women students to join his and other excavations.

At the Ramesseum, for example, his expedition included two of his students, a Miss Paget, and a woman who was to go on to have a successful Egyptological career of her own, Annie Abernethie Pirie (1862-1927). She married the notable Egyptologist James Quibell, and was to assist both her husband and Petrie in further digs. She published books on Egyptian art, and on her experiences in the country, as well as illustrating other books. She also undertook work in the Egyptian gallery of the Aberdeen museum.

Percy Newberry, from a passport photo, 1925.

But the greatest help came from the Egyptologist Percy Newberry (1868-1949). In fact an entire section of The Temple of Mut in Asher, Part V, "Inscriptions", was written by him. This describes the inscriptions found at the site, and prints them in hieroglyphs, as well as in English, another feature of the book which was progressive for its time, and which greatly increases its value for specialists.

Newberry’s academic career included appointments as Brunner Professor of Egyptology at Liverpool University in 1906, as Fellow of King’s College London in 1908, and as Professor of Ancient History and Archaeology at Cairo in 1929. Between 1884 and 1905 he was employed by the Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF) (now the Egypt Exploration Society), and from 1890 onwards directed the Fund’s "Archaeological Survey". The Survey, rather over-ambitiously, aimed to survey every ancient site in Egypt, though was never able to do so. The Survey started off with tombs at Beni Hassan. Newberry published the inscriptions found there, and no doubt this is why Beni Hassan is mentioned so frequently in "Inscriptions."

From The Temple of Mut in Asher we learn that Newberry was staying in Luxor at the time when Maggie started work, most likely assisting Eduard Naville, who was also at that time employed by the EEF. Naville himself may have become interested in the inscriptions found at the Temple of Mut, as he was one of the outstanding hieroglyphic scholars of the time. And this might in fact have been the reason for his persuading de Morgan to allow Maggie to excavate the site.

Maggie, plainly, could not have worked without help. She would at least had a rough idea from her brother Frederick’s archaeological work what she needed to cope with. And this raises various (unanswerable, unfortunately) questions. Did she indeed decide to excavate in the Mut Precinct on little more than a impulse, as she claims in her book, or was she at least pointed in a certain direction?

After all, once she had the concession for the site, then the way would have been open for organisations like the EEF to unofficially step in – as indeed they did. This may explain why the EEF evidently gave Naville and especially Newberry leave from their work for such a time-consuming project.

And besides, having the Archbishop of Canterbury’s daughter (and thereby the British Establishment) on their side would have been more than welcome to not only the EEF, but also to Petrie.

This was because de Morgan’s immediate predecessor as Head of the Antiquities Service, M. Eugène Grébaut, had been unwelcoming towards the EEF, stating that he would not "abandon Ancient Egypt to the English societies and become the humble servant of English tourists". What was more, even the British Consul-General of Egypt, Lord Cromer, did not support British Egyptologists, preferring "deferring to France in Egyptology in return for concessions elsewhere".

Under these circumstances, British Egyptology plainly needed all the support in high places it could get, and at that time few were more highly placed than the Bensons.

Finally, of course, there is the possibility that – and remember this was an age when people competed to put their flag on various pieces of ground – that the Benson and Gourlay expedition planted, as it were, a small Union-Jack (with an EEF symbol sewn onto it) on what was otherwise the exclusive French territory of Karnak Temple. This is hardly imaginable to us, living in an era when Egyptology is truly international, but of course this is history, and we have to try to think like people in the 19th century.

Finally, perhaps Maggie had a certain advantage, in all these politics, of being a woman. Men such as de Morgan, Naville and Newberry were, of course, gentlemen, in the old-fashioned sense; they might have found it personally disagreeable to disoblige a lady. Besides, we know that Maggie, as were most upper-class women of the time, was taught French and German; no doubt Nettie was too. So when speaking to men like de Morgan and Naville, they would have done so in their own languages, which can only have eased things further.

There is also the question of Maggie Benson’s own personality. Was she, in fact, a person who it was easy to say "no" to? We might wonder, in fact, if anyone in her social position was ever told "no", especially by some mere civil servant, even if he was the head of the Antiquites Department! Certainly until her illness in 1896 she seems to have been exceptionally energetic, and not one to let difficulties stand in her way.

To be continued...

The 'bride of the corn'

2008-09-21T04:05:00.000-07:00

I’d like to add a bit to Rosie’s post on corn-dollies, with some information about a very ancient sort from Egypt, known as arūset el-kamh ‘the bride of the corn’. This may, perhaps, be the most ancient sort of corn-dolly known, and – happily – they are still made, in a thousands year old tradition, to the same ancient design.

I bought this example a couple of years ago at Abydos, from a woman selling them just outside the temple. How I wish I’d bought a few more, now, and encouraged a true, surviving, Pharaonic tradition!

Well, Goddess willing, I shall one day go back, and if I can, shall put that right!

(Abydos, by the way, is easily reachable from Luxor by train; maybe an option for the free day that many tours offer. The ever-helpful Tourist-Police will spot you, and help you to get from station to temple, and back again).

The best information about ‘brides of the corn’ comes from that great classic of Egyptian life during the last century, Winifred Blackman’s The Fellahin of Upper Egypt, first published 1927, and now re-printed by the American University in Cairo Press, 2000. (It is a fascinating book, and really is a must-have for your Egypt shelf).

I can’t do better than to quote at length from the book:

‘Before any of the corn is cut some of the villagers go into the fields and pluck the finest ears by hand. These are plaited into a special form, and this object, called the ‘bride of the corn’ (arūset el-kamh) is used as a charm. One may be suspended over the house-door as an antidote to the evil eye; another may be hung up in the room containing the stores of food, as a charm to ensure abundance. Many tradesmen hand such objects in their shop-windows, believing that this will bring them plenty of customers.

Again, in some parts of Egypt, the ‘bride of the corn’ is placed on the heaps of grain after the winnowing is completed, as a charm to secure a good harvest the following year. … The ‘bride’ may be left hanging until it is replaced at the next harvest, or again, it may be allowed to remain in its place until it falls to pieces.

(pp. 171-172)

This photo from the book illustrate ‘brides’ made in the 1920s; as you can see, they are perfectly identical to my modern one.

However, in the history of ‘brides of the corn’, a mere 81 years is less than the blink of an eye!

Winifred’s brother, Aylward Manley Blackman, was a famous Egyptologist, and information gained from him encouraged her write a chapter of her book called ‘Ancient Egyptian Analogies’, which showed how ancient many of the customs, and traditions, etc., that she noted were. After all, every nation is founded on its past.

So another quote, and two more photos from the book:

‘The object now known as arūset el-kamh ‘the bride of the corn’ is depicted in several Theban tomb-chapels of the 18th Dynasty, and can possibly be traced back to the Old Kingdom in a different form.
…

According to several ancient representations of winnowing this object was placed on the winnowing-floor while the winnowers were at work and that an offering was laid before it consisting either of a vessel of water and dishes containing cakes, etc., or of a bowl of water only.’
(pp. 307-308)

So as you can see from these photos, the ‘bride of the corn’ from Abydos is a design that is around 3,500 years old! Similar ‘brides’ would have in fact been familiar to the ancient worshippers at Abydos.

It was one of those moments, in fact, that you sometimes experience in Egypt, where millennia fall away in an instant…

Corn Dollies.

2008-09-18T11:03:00.000-07:00

Isn’t it funny how one train of thought leads to another it’s as if the Goddess is taking us on some journey of unfolding so that we may become enlightened in some way that She wishes for us.This month I have been interested in learning all about wire wrapping & weaving as part of my current handicraft obsession. I’m intent on making woven/wrapped semi precious & natural stones into lovely jewellery which led me to discover some interesting facts about corn dollies.

I read with interest that whatever you can do with weaving in basketry can also be applied to working with wire for jewellery making.

I had it in mind to practice with copper wire first until I get the hang of the various weaving techniques & then use sterling silver and gold at some future point for my gemstone pieces.Then you know how sometimes you wake up with mad harebrained idea’s about trying to apply some new technique to an old problem (a bit like a Galileo ‘Eureka’ moment without the bath)Well this happened a couple of weeks ago when I suddenly awoke with the compulsion to look at how ‘corn dollies’ were constructed & somehow apply the same weaving principle to wire.Corn Dollies here in England can be quite elaborate affairs, from my folklore studies I learned that every region throughout the UK (and further a field also) has its own particular signature corn dolly, evident by the design itself & colour of the decorative ribbons attached. No deviation was ever made from the characteristics of the corn dollie construction of that particular village.

All of these old customs were particularly significant to this time of the year – September -Time of the Harvest.

Corn Dollies were sacred offering made to honour the Goddess in her spirit of Bountiful Mother. Both Demeter and Ceres are examples of more ancient archetypal corn Mothers.

Many, many traditions surround the corn dollies themselves; probably the most important for the farmer & community would be that of ‘giving thanks’ for a plentiful harvest of the all important corn. When the final wheat sheaf had been cut it was from this that one big dolly called ‘The Kern baby’ be made, sometimes they were built into huge either giant size effigies or at least life size and decorated with white clothes and brightly coloured ribbons, these represented the next Springtime and were kept until then & usually ploughed back into the field to ensure another plentiful harvest.Smaller corn dollies were made for the individual homes to ensure a good year ahead like a lucky charm they were hung up in the home.Another quaint custom of countryside youth was that of ‘Countryman's Favours’ these were small plaited corn motifs such as hearts, that were made by a young gentleman or lady and given to a member of the opposite sex to wear over the heart. Which indicated that they were definitely interested and noticeably so if the favour be worn.Incidently the word ‘Doll’ derives from the ancient Greek word ‘eidolon’ translated as ‘idol’.With all my corn dollie inspiration gathered I think I shall be making some little plaited wire versions of my own at the very least I shall be having a go at making a ‘Bridget’s Cross’.

Happy Harvest time everyone.

by Rosie Weaver

http://witchcrafter.blogspot.com/

For further references see:

www.strawcraftsmen.co.uk/project03.html

paganwiccan.about.com/.../ss/Brighid_Dolly.htm

hubpages.com/hub/Mabon/

Book Review - Current Research in Egyptology 2007

2008-09-11T06:31:00.000-07:00

This is the most recent of the increasingly important series of Current Research, first started in 2000, when it was published by British Archaeological Reports. These days it’s published, in a slightly different format, by Oxbow Books (David Brown Books in the USA) and obtained from their website, price £28.00. Back numbers in the series are also available.

Each book is the proceedings of the yearly Current Research in Egyptology Annual Symposium. These offer a chance for graduate students in Egyptology around the world to present papers, and to have them published – something that is often unavailable to students.

In 2007, a total of 40 students, from 10 different countries, presented papers at Swansea University, Wales, whose Egypt Centre has an important place in European Egyptology. Of these, 13 papers are published in Current Research, which was edited this year by Egyptologists Kenneth Griffin and Meg Grundlach. (Different editors are chosen each year, avoiding any potential bias in favour of someone’s favourite subjects).

Ideas like Current Research, a short-run and cheaply available paperback, are one way of overcoming the problem of Egyptological publication. Another, equally valid, is online publication, e.g. the British Museum’s British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan (BMSAES) series, available on http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/online_journals/bmsaes/ (or of course via a search-engine under “bmsaes”).

Which papers to choose to appear in the book must be a considerable problem each year. Some papers can be excluded as they are part of a larger work in progress. The rest are generally chosen to represent as wide a range of topics as possible.

Still, I can’t help but wish that such papers as, for example, Are you sitting comfortably? Purges and Proctology in Ancient Egypt, by Jacky Finch of the University of Manchester had found a place in print! Papers not published are listed, and every year there are one or two gems that you sincerely hope will appear one day.

Still, what is published is certainly worth the price of the book, and I found the 2007 edition particularly full of absolutely fascinating information, from which even the most knowledgeable Egyptologist can learn.

One of my own favourites was Divine determinatives in the Papyrus of Ani, by Rachel Aronin, of the University of Pennsylvania. The Papyrus of Ani is, of course, the best-known example of the so-called “Book of the Dead”, having appeared in print. Its vignettes, particularly those of the Double Judgement scene, have often been reproduced.

But as Rachel Aronin points out, these were meant to be far more than mere illustrations; there is a close relationship between the text, the pictures, and the determinatives for the deities present. It is with the determinatives, of course, that the essay is most concerned; the ways in which the names of Goddesses and Gods were written. Why, for instance, does Hathor never have the familiar snake determinative for Goddesses after Her name?

Other fascinating reads are Wells and cisterns in Pharaonic Egypt, by Henning Franzmeiter, and The central halls in the Ptolemaic temples by Amr Gaber.

And there is so much else to read here, such as the question Did Ramesses III settle the Sea-Peoples in Canaan? by Pawel Wolinski, and Monuments in context: Experiences of the colossal in Ancient Egypt, by Campbell Price. Just how did Egyptians regard those huge colossi… in a world where we are familiar with the huge, and the means to move huge things, we can often overlook just how amazing such things as giant statues and obelisks must have been.

Here the author asks if colossal structures were far more than just Pharaonic egocentricity. Did the huge communal effort of assembling, moving, and then looking at them provide a means of binding society together?

What were the origins of astronomy? The subject may be considerably older than you think. In The first Decan, Rosalind Park looks at its possible Predynastic origins, 5,500 years ago.

And there is far more, of course. Worth the price? Well, you would need to have a more than superficial interest in Egyptology to appreciate the books. They are not aimed at the general reader. However, this certainly does not mean that they are written in an inaccessible, scholarly way, and the books are good for dipping into for quite short reads – the essays are, on average, around 10 pages long.

Treat yourself to a copy? Well, why not. I do each year, anyway…

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses

2008-09-09T10:50:00.001-07:00

Recollections of Egyptian Princesses
British and American Women in Egypt, 1820 – 1920.

1. Marget Benson (1865 - 1916) and Janet Agnes "Nettie" Gourlay (1863 - 1912)

The MA thesis that I am always threatening to do is a study of (western) women travellers in and writers about during the 19th – early 20th centuries. Hopefully (if certain courses actually run this year) I will be seriously busy with it from next month onwards.

Now, I don’t take quite the same approach to my Master’s thesis as Finn (played by Winona Ryder) does in How to make an American quilt. For a start, I just can’t seem to find the hunky fellas to distract me! Nope, this is just toil and sweat over piles of dusty, and sometimes quite ancient books. (In fact how come Finn actually manages to produce the amount of material she does, with her intensive love-life?)

But just as American quilt is a series of stories about women (who I have come to think of as "my Ladies"), so is my thesis. And the stories are every bit – if not actually more so – as interesting as the stories in the film, with the advantage that they are real-life. I really have met some remarkable characters, who so very often "found" themselves in Egypt, outside the constraints that their own societies placed on them.

Far too interesting, I think, to keep just to myself and to some long-suffering tutor!
So in this occasional blog, which I guess will probably follow my own research, I’d like to introduce a few of my Ladies to you.

The thesis, natch, will end up with a suitably boring academic title. That is the fate of all theses, and serve ‘em jolly well right. But for this blog, I would like to name it in honour of my own personal favourite Lady, Miss Ellen Chennells, governess to Princess Zeynab, who called her book "Recollections of an Egyptian Princess".

So here goes. The Ladies will come in no particular order. But as it happens, we will start with a tale of madness, lesbianism, the rich and famous, near war between Britain and France, attempted murder – and pioneering Egyptology. Beat that. (Still think that history is boring?)

Janet and Agnes are shown in the picture above; Nettie is on the left of the image, wearing white, and Maggie on the right, in black.

This year, a remarkable mid-summer excavation was undertaken at the Precinct of Mut, at the Temple of Karnak, by an expedition from John Hopkins University, who, together with Brooklyn Museum, have had the concession for many years. (You can read their online excavation blogs on the website "Hopkins in Egypt today", or find it through the interesting digs section of "Egyptology Today").

Johns Hopkins sent a mostly female team of archaeologists. And that is particularly appropriate, as one of the earliest excavations of the site was done by a two-woman team, pioneering the way for the large numbers of women now studying, and practicing, Egyptology. (In fact more women students than men, I hear…)

For ages Margaret Benson’s remarkable archaeological work was largely forgotten. A book about the Benson family published in 1971, for example, only gives a single sentence to it. If she was remembered at all, it was simply as a member of the Benson family.

The Bensons were, in fact, pretty famous; pa was Archbishop of Canterbury, they were close friends of the Gladstones (William Gladstone was a notable 19th century British Prime Minister), and the Wordsworths, the family of the poet. And one brother wrote the well-known Mapp and Lucia books, which are still in print.

But times change, fortunately, and now Margaret and Janet are now increasingly recognised for their achievement in being the first women to run an archaeological excavation. What’s more, the quality of their archaeological work has been re-assessed; the present excavators of the Temple of Mut, the Brooklyn Museum and Johns Hopkins University, make it clear in their dig website that: "their work was not bad for their day." Short recent biographies of both women have appeared, including Wikipedia entries, which give them credit for their work. As they jolly well should.

This strange story begins with a rather strange man, Edward White Benson, who decided that he was going to bring up a young girl especially to be his wife. Benson was later Archbishop of Canterbury, so you can imagine the headlines if this happened now…

Anyway, the unfortunate female who he selected was in fact a poorer cousin, Mary "Minnie" Sidgwick, who Benson chose when she was only eleven, and married when she was eighteen. At the very least it was totally selfish of Benson, effectively depriving Mary of any kind of normal childhood or adolescence, but he was, to say the least, a disturbed, violent character, with little sense of moral proportion in anything.

Whether Benson quite got the woman of his dreams is open to question, anyway; Mary wrote that she only felt that she really accepted him as a husband when he was dead, stretched out for his funeral in Canterbury Cathedral. In any case, she was a lifelong and enthusiastic supporter of the pink team, and so were her two daughters.

They had six children, of which Margaret was the fourth eldest. Margaret was at least given a reasonable education for a woman at the time, attending Truo High School and later Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, where she did very well, getting a first in something called the Womens’ Honour School of Philosophy.

In those days women were not allowed to take Oxbridge degrees; if this series gets as far as Winifred Blackman, we’ll meet another academically brilliant woman who suffered from this. However, Oxbridge was to become increasingly isolated in this respect; by the end of the 19th century women were taking degree level Egyptology courses at University College London, as we shall see.

Margaret was also considered to be good at art. She was actually tutored in art at Oxford by no less than the artist and critic Ruskin, who was supposed to have told her that he could teach her nothing further. A bit of a double-edged remark, when you think of it, especially coming from Rusin, but still, let’s be charitable. Anyway, you can decide for yourself from this drawing of one of the family pets, her favourite subject-matter.

She might have gone on to do very well at Oxford. But another strange Victorian convention was that the eldest daughter had to live with the family. So when Maggie’s older sister, Mary Eleanor ("Nellie"), died in 1890, aged 27, of diptheria, Maggie was forced to come down from university. Unlike Nellie she was shy, and did not take well to the social duties of an Archbishop’s daughter. The Benson family, given the tyrannical nature of the father, was also a far from easy place to be amongst.

Hypochondria was a fashionable Victorian way out, and one rather unsympathetic biography suggests that it was Maggie’s, too. However, her – mental and physical - ill-health actually seems to have been all too genuine; in fact it became increasingly serious.

Besides, she could sometimes escape; In 1893, she joined her brother Edward Frederick in his archaeological excavations at Athens. Early in 1894 she visited Egypt. She journeyed along the Nile as far south as Aswan, and began to learn hieroglyphs. She says in her book, The Temple of Mut in Asher, that it was during this journey that she first saw the Temple of Mut, part of the Karnak temple complex. She returned to Egypt later in the same year, having decided to excavate the Temple of Mut, and early in 1895 started work there.

More of this later. It’s a story in itself, so I’ll get the bio. out of the way first.

Generally, archaeological work in Egypt takes place only during autumn and winter; interestingly one of the rare exceptions has been this year’s summer dig by John Hopkins in the Precinct of Mut. So Maggie returned home, coming back to Karnak for the 1895 – 1896 digging-season. And it was during 1896 that the great love of her life, Nettie Gourlay, began to assist her.
Unfortunately we don’t know much about Nettie. She has been described rather unsympathetically as "rather a plain, abnormally silent young woman of thirty-three". Whether or not, she was to remain on intimate terms with Maggie for a long time.

Nettie was born in Dundee, Scotland, and her family obviously had enough money to allow her to study at University College London (UCL), under the great Professor (later Sir) William Flinders Petrie, the father of modern Egyptology.

Flinders Petrie was ahead of his time in many respects, not least his acceptance of women students not only on his Egyptology course at UCL – he had been offered the Chair of Egyptian Archaeology and Philology in 1892 – but as archaeologists on his excavations.

In 1896, in fact, Flinders Petrie team, working nearby at the Ramesseum, included two women, Miss Pirie and Miss Paget. Whether Nettie was also one of the team, or simply visiting Egypt at the time we don’t know; but it seems very likely that Flinders Petrie at least recommended her to Maggie as an assistant. Certainly Flinders Petrie was to give the Benson and Gourlay expedition a great deal of help.

Indeed, Nettie seems to have had ambitions to become a career Egyptologist, staying in the country after the end of the excavations at the Mut Temple in 1897 to help the Egyptologist Percy Newberry, who had also become attached to the expedition, to publish some of the finds made there. After that, however, she unfortunately seems to drop from sight; in 1900 she visited Egypt again, with Margaret, as mere tourists, and in 1906 they toured the West Country of England together.

Archbishop Benson died suddenly in 1896. Free at last, Maggie’s mother and brothers went with her to Luxor later that year for what turned out to be the last season of the expedition.

Unfortunately several of the family were to fall seriously ill in Egypt. Maggie’s brother Fred, and her mother’s live-in lover, Lucy Tait, caught typhoid fever. And Maggie, in turn, caught pleurisy, in fact very nearly dying of it; her life was only saved by emergency surgery in her hotel at Luxor, by a doctor who fortunately also happened to be staying there. A short time later she suffered a heart-attack, and this ended her work on the Temple of Mut.

To make things worse, this was far from all. From this time on she started to suffer increasingly from various forms of mental illness, including depression. By 1906 she was suffering hallucinations. She seems to have been jealous of her mother’s relationship with Lucy, particularly the (seemingly rather open) sexual element of this.

Finally she snapped. In around 1906 – 1907 (different biogs give different years, though I’d guess 1907, as she was happily with Nettie the year before) she finally went for her mother with the carving-knife at dinner. It was scary; it seems that she really meant to kill Mary; she was only prevented with some difficulty.

From then onwards, inevitably, she spend the rest of her life in the kind of homes for the mentally ill that the rich could afford, or at least under heavy medical care. She finally died in her sleep in 1916.

I’m left with a sense of waste; Maggie could have done a great deal. She was highly intelligent and multi-talented, and was learning Egyptology fast; who knows what she might have achieved.
She wrote seven books during her life, including the one which has made her famous, The Temple of Mut in Asher. Subjects range from stories about her pets to some pretty deep theological stuff, a book on economics called Capital, labour and trade, and the outlook, and what she herself considered her magnum opus, an attempt to reconcile science with Christianity, calledThe venture of rational faith, eventually published in 1908. After her father’s death she also edited three books written by him.

Next, the amazing story of the excavation of the "Temple of Mut in Asher". But to prevent this from becoming too long, I’ll post that separately.

Parthenon - Local Goddess - TN Museum

2008-09-08T11:51:00.001-07:00

I know some of you may already know of this treasure in the state of Tennessee in the USA. It was a very unusual find for me a few years back, and I have yet to visit there myself.

Apparently this building replica is a museum run by the state parks and recreation department and it does indeed feature as the main focus point a copy of the statue that once stood in the Parthenon in Athens. From the pictures I have seen from the links it is pretty incredible.

I will post the urls for your look at this wonderful place at the end of this note.

This brings up the question; could a functioning public Temple to any Goddess actually 'survive' in the Western World?

If anyone were to attempt to use this Parthenon replica on a regular basis for Goddess Devotion, I am sure there would be a strong and very disagreeable response generated based upon the present opinion of the majority of religions of today - that Goddess oriented religions are not seen as viable nor acceptable.

We are often reminded that the religions and the Goddesses of the past are just that, thought of being long gone into the past. This 'history' focus by the general public upon goddess related faith would be the present day accepted approach, as to the actual use of such a wonderful replica of the Parthenon.

So as I look at this wonder and into the eyes of the statue of Athena as she holds out Nike for us all to see and ponder - we see the Goddess coming back within her many forms, by way of many means, back into the world.

This could be taken as a sign that she will be present once more as a choice of spiritual path amidst the religions that will be present at that time. Of course the world will have changed a bit to let the goddess exist along side the other religions of the world and those religions found in the West, but she will be there to continue her work amongst us.

The urls to plan a trip to see this replica of the Parthenon.

The Parthenon

"The Parthenon stands proudly as the centerpiece of Centennial Park, Nashville's premier urban park. The re-creation of the 42-foot statue Athena is the focus of the Parthenon just as it was in ancient Greece. The building and the Athena statue are both full-scale replicas of the Athenian originals."

AND

The shared photo of Athena in her gilded form inside this Museum replica of the Parthenon.

Anna

Guild of Hypatia opening new media expression

2008-09-05T15:08:00.001-07:00

The Guild of Hypatia is taking on a new look and new means of supporting the intellectual and spiritual exploration of the world and of life we find ourselves within.

There are many new media formats available to share what each member is experiencing within their community, workplace and news important to them. People who are working with ideas found within the study of history, archeology, medicine, communications, spirituality, art and local community are encouraged to write informative pieces within this Guild blog format. It is hoped that open and informed opinions supporting the exploration of ancient history, spirituality, public opinion, local events, women’s issues and Goddess, could be expressed here by multiple authors who are involved within their private and community life creating open areas for such to be discussed, shared and celebrated.

Contact the Guild of Hypatia for details on how you can share through postings here your informational articles of personal, community, art, music, academic and spiritual interests. The Guild is here to support your work where you are and inform others of the thoughts, opinions and events near them around the world.

Come together with us and share what you know about the world.

Guild Moderators
Margaret & Anna

Guild of Hypatia