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Emily Ruete was born in Zanzibar (in modern day Tanzania) as Sayyida Salme, Princess of Zanzibar and Oman. She was the youngest of the 36 children of Sayyid Said bin Sultan Al-Busaid, Sultan of Zanzibar and Oman. Her extraordinary life story is the subject of Memoirs of an Arabian Princess from Zanzibar.
Princess Salme, daughter of Sa‘id ibn Sultan, ruler of Oman and Zanzibar, was born in Zanzibar on August 30, 1844. In 1866 she fled to Aden where she was baptized with the Christian name Emily and where she married the German merchant Rudolph Heinrich Ruete. In Hamburg three children were born. Her husband died in 1870, and after that she lived in several cities in Germany. In 1885 and again in 1888 she went to Zanzibar. Between 1889 and 1914 she lived in Jaffa and Beirut, and afterwards again in Germany. She died in Jena in 1924. The present work contains a short biography of Princess Salme/Emily Ruete and of her son Rudolph Said-Ruete, a new English translation of her Memoirs, and an English version of her other writings, unpublished so far: Letters Home, Sequels to the Memoirs and Syrian Customs and Usages.
This unique book is the only autobiography written by a Princess of Zanzibar in the 19th century. Emily Ruete was born Sayyida, Princess of Zanzibar, in 1844. Zanzibar was then ruled by Omani Arabs and had grown rich from the slave trade and ivory from continental Africa and spices from the island of Zanzibar. They had spread their influence and swahili language as far west as Kisangani on the Congo river. It was a time of european traders and missionaries, harbingers of colonization and crusades against the slave trade. The Princess eloped with a German trader and moved to Germany, having been rejected by her family in Zanzibar. In this book, which she wrote to leave a record of her history for her children, she describes life in the Zanzibar royal palace and plantations, life in the harem, traditions, palace intrigues and overthrows, slaves, the status of women etc. This is a great book for anyone interested in Zanzibar or the history of Eastern Africa.
Emily Ruete was born in 1840 as Princess Sayyida of Zanzibar. Set against a backdrop of political intrigue in the great age of European colonialism, this memoir offers a portrait of 19th-century Arab and African life, not only in the palace, but in the city and plantations as well.
Memoirs of An Arabian Princess: An Autobiography is the memoirs of Emily Ruete (born Sayyida Salme) , princess of Zanzibar and Oman. It is believed to be the first autobiography of an Arab woman.
When thinking of intrepid travelers from past centuries, we don't usually put Muslim women at the top of the list. And yet, the stunning firsthand accounts in this collection completely upend preconceived notions of who was exploring the world. Editors Siobhan Lambert-Hurley, Daniel Majchrowicz, and Sunil Sharma recover, translate, annotate, and provide historical and cultural context for the 17th- to 20th-century writings of Muslim women travelers in ten different languages. Queens and captives, pilgrims and provocateurs, these women are diverse. Their connection to Islam is wide-ranging as well, from the devout to those who distanced themselves from religion. What unites these adventurers is a concern for other women they encounter, their willingness to record their experiences, and the constant thoughts they cast homeward even as they traveled a world that was not always prepared to welcome them. Perfect for readers interested in gender, Islam, travel writing, and global history, Three Centuries of Travel Writing by Muslim Women provides invaluable insight into how these daring women experienced the world—in their own voices.
When thinking of intrepid travelers from past centuries, we don't usually put Muslim women at the top of the list. And yet, the stunning firsthand accounts in this collection completely upend preconceived notions of who was exploring the world. Editors Siobhan Lambert-Hurley, Daniel Majchrowicz, and Sunil Sharma recover, translate, annotate, and provide historical and cultural context for the 17th- to 20th-century writings of Muslim women travelers in ten different languages. Queens and captives, pilgrims and provocateurs, these women are diverse. Their connection to Islam is wide-ranging as well, from the devout to those who distanced themselves from religion. What unites these adventurers is a concern for other women they encounter, their willingness to record their experiences, and the constant thoughts they cast homeward even as they traveled a world that was not always prepared to welcome them. Perfect for readers interested in gender, Islam, travel writing, and global history, Three Centuries of Travel Writing by Muslim Women provides invaluable insight into how these daring women experienced the world—in their own voices.
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