Emily Ruete

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Emily Ruete (1844-1924) was born in Zanzibar as Sayyida Salme, Princess of Zanzibar and Oman. She was a daughter of Sayyid Said bin Sultan Al-Busaid, Sultan of Zanzibar and Oman.

[edit] Early life, Zanzibar

Sayyida Salme was born on August 30, 1844 as daughter of Sultan Said and Jilfidan, a Circassian concubine. Her first years were spent in the huge Bet il Mtoni palace, by the sea about eight kilometers north of Stone Town. (The palace was mostly demolished in 1914). She grew up bilingual in Arabic and Swahili. In 1851 she moved to Bet il Watoro, the house of her brother Majid bin Said of Zanzibar, the later sultan. Her brother taught her to ride and to shoot. In 1853 she moved with her mother to Bet il Tani. She secretly taught herself to write, a skill which was unusual for women at the time.

When her father died in 1856 she was declared of age, twelve years old, and received her paternal heritage. This consisted of a plantation with a residence, and 5,429 pounds. After her father's death, her brother Sayyid Thuwaini bin Said al-Said became Sultan of Muscat and Oman, while her brother Majid became Sultan of Zanzibar.

In 1859 her mother died. Salme received her maternal inheritance, which consisted of three plantations. The same year a dispute broke out between her brothers Majid and Barghash bin Said of Zanzibar. Though she favoured Majid, her favourite sister Khwala made her side with Barghash. Because she could write she acted (at the age of fifteen) as secretary of Barghash's party. However, with the help of an English gunboat the insurrection of Barghash was soon brought to an end, and Barghash was send into exile in Bombay for two years. Salme withdrew to Kisimbani, one of her estates.

Salme eventually moved back to Stone Town and made up with Majid. This earned her the lasting enmity from Barghash, as well as a split with her favorite sister Khwala.

While living in Stone Town she became acquainted with her neighbor, a German merchant, Rudolph Heinrich Ruete. In 1866 she fled with him to Aden, converted to Christianity and married Ruete, and moved with him to the North German Confederation.

[edit] Life in Europe

Emily and Rudolph H. Ruete settled in Hamburg and had one son and two daughters.

Her husband died in 1870 after a traffic accident, leaving Ruete in difficult economic circumstances. Partly to alleviate these economic problems she wrote Memoirs of an Arabian Princess from Zanzibar, first published in the German Empire in 1886, later published in the United States and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The book provides the first known autobiography of an Arab woman. The book presents the reader with an intimate picture of life in Zanzibar between 1850 and 1865, and an inside portrait of her brothers Majid bin Said of Zanzibar and Barghash bin Said of Zanzibar, the later sultans of Zanzibar.

After the death of her husband Emily Ruete was caught up in the colonial plans of Otto von Bismarck. There were speculations that von Bismarck wanted to install the son of Emily Ruete as Sultan of Zanzibar. She revisited Zanzibar in 1885 and in 1888. Between 1889 and 1914 she lived in Beirut, Lebanon and Jaffa.

In 1992 the book An Arabian Princess Between Two Worlds was published, making for the first time Emily Ruete's letters home, with her reactions on life in Europe, available to the public.

There is a permanent exhibition about Emily Ruete in the House of Wonders, the palace constructed by her brother, Sultan Barghash, in Stone Town on Zanzibar.

[edit] References

• Emily Ruete, (1888): Memoirs of an Arabian Princess from Zanzibar, (Many reprints).
• Emily Ruete, Ulrich Haarmann (Editor), E. Van Donzel (Editor), Leiden, Netherlands, (1992): An Arabian Princess Between Two Worlds: Memoirs, Letters Home, Sequels to the Memoirs, Syrian Customs and Usages. Presents the reader with a picture of life in Zanzibar between 1850 - 1865, and with an intelligent observer's reactions to life in Germany in the Bismarck period. Emily Ruete's writings describe her attempts to recover her Zanzibar inheritance and her homesickness. ISBN 90-04-09615-9