Imagined Empires

by Zeinab Abul-Magd

  75. Al-Amir, “Risala fi man Tawalla al-Sa‘id min al-’Umara al-Jarakisa,” 2–3.

  76. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 1, Case 148, p. 107, 17 Rajab 1170, NAE.

  77. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 5, Part 1, Case 7, p. 3, 8 Rabi‘ al-Awwal 1173, NAE.

  78. Mentions of the Habatirs can be found, for example, in Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 53, case 180, p. 67, 11 Jumad Awwal 1216, NAE.

  79. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 2:72–73.

  80. Ibid., 2:350.

  81. Cezzar, Ottoman Egypt in the Eighteenth Century, 41; al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 2:306; Ahmad, Al-Sa‘id fi ‘Ahd Shaykh al-‘Arab Hammam, 137.

  82. Daniel Crecelius, The Roots of Modern Egypt: A Study of the Regimes of ‘Ali Bey al-Kabir and Muhammad Bey Abu al-Dhahab, 1760–1775 (Minneapolis: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1981), 51, 59–61; Ahmad, Al-Sa‘id fi ‘Ahd Shaykh al-‘Arab Hammam, 137–40.

  83. Ahmad, Al-Sa‘id fi ‘Ahd Shaykh al-‘Arab Hammam, 146–47; Crecelius, Roots of Modern Egypt, 60–62; Denon, Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:255–56

  84. See Ahmad, Al-Sa‘id fi ‘Ahd Shaykh al-‘Arab Hammam.

  85. Qina Court, Portfolio 1, 10 Sha‘ban 1187 in Haridi, Dawr al-Sa‘id fi Misr al-‘Uthmaniyya, appendix 14, 423–25.

  86. Cezzar, Ottoman Egypt in the Eighteenth Century, 27–28.

  87. Gabor Agoston and Bruce Masters (eds.), Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire (New York: Facts on File, 2009), 462–63.

  88. Lane, Account of the Customs and Manners of the Modern Egyptians, 3.

  89. According to a medical report by Colonel Wilson, who came with British troops to Egypt in 1800. The report is quoted a few years later in John Redman Coxe, The Philadelphia Medical Museum (Philadelphia: T & G Palmer, 1809), 6:9–10.

  90. Ibid., 10.

  91. Edward Lane, Description of Egypt (Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2000), 32–33. Clot Bey mentioned this theory but then refuted it in Clot Bey, “On the Plague of Egypt,” in The Eclectic Journal of Medicine, Vol. IV from November 1839 to October 1840 (Philadelphia: Haswell et al., 1840), 379.

  92. Haridi, Dawr al-Sa‘id fi Misr al-‘Uthmaniyya, 236–37, 244; M. Claude Savary, Lettres sur l’Égypte, new ed. (Paris: Chez BLXUET jeune, 1789), 2:16; C.S. Sonnini, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt Undertaken by Order of the Old Government of France (London: T. Gillet, printer, 1799), 1:673. See also al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al’Athar, vol. 3. And for full account, see Jane Hathaway, A Tale of Two Factions (Binghamton: SUNY Press, 2003).

  93. Clot Bey, “On the Plague of Egypt,”378.

  94. Olivier, Travels in the Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Persia, 161.

  95. Agoston and Masters, Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire, 462.

  96. Bruce McGowan, “The Age of the Ayan, 1699–1812,” in Halil Inalcik, Donald Quataert, et al. (eds.), An Economic and Social History of the Ottoman Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 651.

  97. Haridi, Dawr al-Sa‘id fi Misr al-‘Uthmaniyy, 236–37. About the deaths of Mamluk knights from the plague, see al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-Athar, vol. 3.

  98. John Campbell, The Travels and Adventures of Edward Brown, Esq. (London: Printed by J. Applebee, 1739), 335.

  99. Ahmad, Al-’Idara fi Misr fi al-‘Asr al-‘Uthmani, 424–25.

  100. Cezzar, Ottoman Egypt in the Eighteenth Century, 27–28.

  101. Ibid., 250–51.

  102. Denon, Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:207–8, 217.

  103. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat No.53, Case 286, p. 123, Jumada al-Akhir 1216, NAE.

  104. Ibid.

  105. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 53, Case 269, p. 113, Rabi ‘Awwal 1216, NAE.

  CHAPTER 2: THE FRENCH, PLAGUE ENCORE, AND JIHAD

  1. Vivant Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, pendant les Campagne du Général Bonaparte (Paris: Imprimerie de P. Didot l’aine, 1802), 2:120. The translation is from Vivant Denon, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt (New York: Arno Press, 1973), 2:199.

  2. About Copts, see Nasir Ahmad Ibrahim, Al-Faransiyyun fi Sa‘id Misr: Al-Muwajaha al-Maliyya, 1798–1801 (Cairo: Darl-Kutub wal-Watha’iq al-Qawmiyya, 2005), 135–73. About the Arab tribes, see Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:139–40.

  3. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin (eds.), The Post-colonial Studies Reader (London: Routledge, 2006), 93–116.

  4. Edward Said, Orientalism (New York: Vintage, 1979), 66.

  5. Ibid., 7 (emphasis in original).

  6. See ’Ilham Muhamamd Dhuhni, Misr fi Kitabat al-Rahhala wal-Qanasil al-Faransiyyin fil-Qarn al-Thamin ‘Ashr (Cairo: al-Hay’a al-Misriyya al-‘Amma lil-Kitab, 1992); and Ilham Muhamamd Dhuhni, Misr fi Kitabat al-Rahhala wal-Qanasil al-Faransiyyin fil-Qarn al-Tsi‘ ‘Ashr (Cairo: al-Hay’a al-Misriyya al-‘Amma lil-Kitab, 1995).

  7. Monthly Review or Literary Journal 76 (January–June 1787): 567.

  8. M. Claude Savary, Lettres sur l’Égypte, new ed. (Paris: Chez BLXUET jeune, 1789), 2:109–10.

  9. Ibid., 2:115–16. The translation is from M. Claude Savary, Letters on Egypt, 3rd ed. (London: G.G. and J. Robison, 1799), 2:28–29.

  10. Savary, Lettres sur l’Égypte, 2:279–182.

  11. Ibid., 3:19–22, 184.

  12. C.S. Sonnini, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt Undertaken by Order of the Old Government of France (London: T. Gillet, printer, 1799), 1:287.

  13. Ibid., 1:192–94. Also see 264–65.

  14. Ibid., 1:196–97.

  15. Ibid., 1:312.

  16. Ibid., 1:186.

  17. Ibid., 1:188 (emphasis in original).

  18. Ibid., 1:239. Quote is on 244.

  19. Ibid., 1:203.

  20. Ibid., 1:311.

  21. Ibid., 1:214.

  22. Ibid., 1:230–31. Also see 232–33.

  23. Ibid., 1:204, 215.

  24. Juan Cole, Napoleon’s Egypt: Invading the Middle East (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 12–20.

  25. Ibid., 16.

  26. Jennifer Pitts, A Turn to Empire: The Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain and France (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005), 168–73.

  27. Michael Doyle, Empires (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986), 307.

  28. Cole, Napoleon’s Egypt, 15.

  29. Ibid., 5–6.

  30. Ibid., 11–12.

  31. ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti, Al-Jabarti’s Chronicle of the French Occupation, Shamuel Moreh (trans.) (Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener, 1975), 26–27.

  32. ‘Abd Al-‘Aziz Jamal al-Din, “Al-‘Amaliyyat al-‘Askariyya fi Sa‘id Misr bayn ‘Aamayy 1798/1799,” appendix 1 in ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-Athar fil-Tarajim wal-Akhbar (Cairo: Lajnat al-Bayan al-‘Arabi, 1958–), 4:382–85.

  33. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 50, pp. 111–14, 21 Rabi‘ al-Awwal 1213, Archival Code 1169–000050; Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 50, pp. 116–118, 3 Jumada al-Awwal 1213, Archival Code 1169–000050, both in NAE.

  34. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 51, p. 284, 35 Dhu al-Qi‘da 1214, Archival Code 1169–000051, NAE.

  35. ‘Izzat Hasan Effendi al-Darandali, Al-Hamla al-Faransiyya ‘ala Misr fi Daw’ Makhtut ‘Uthmani, Makhtutat Dianama, Jamal Sa‘id ‘Abd al-Ghani (trans. and ed.) (Cairo: al-Hay’a al-Misriyya al-‘Amma lil-Kitab, 1999), 367; Husam Muhammad ‘Abd al-Mu‘ti, Al-‘Ilaqat al-Misriyya al-Hijaziyya fi al-Qarn al-Thamin ‘Ashr (Cairo: al-Hay’a al-‘Amma lil-Kitab, 1999), 63–70; Jamal al-Din, “al-‘Amaliyyat al-‘Askariyya fi Sa‘id Misr,” 382–85.

  36. Jamal al-Din, “al-‘Amaliyyat al-‘Askariyya fi Sa‘id Misr,” 410–27; E.L. F Haut, Mémoires d’un officer de l’armée française (Cairo: Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales d’Egypte, 2005), 252–70; D.J. Larrey, Memoirs of Military Surgery and Campaigns of the French Army, Richard Willmott Hall (trans.) (Baltimore: Joseph Cushing, 1914), 1:128; Nabil al-Sayyid al-Tukhi, Sa‘id Misr fi ‘Ahd al-Hamla al-Faransiyya, 1798–1801 (Cairo: al-Hay’a al-Misriyya al-‘Amma lil-Kitab, 1997).

  37
. Mémoires sur l’Égypte, publiés pendant les campagnes du Général Bonaparte (Paris: Imprimerie de P. Didot l’aine, 1800), 146–55.

  38. Vivant Denon, “Discourse du citoyen Denon,” in Mémoires sur l’Égypte, 410.

  39. Ibid.

  40. Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:120–21. The translation is from Denon, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt, 2:199–200.

  41. See, for example, Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:131–32.

  42. Ibid., 149.

  43. Ibid., 230–31, 235–36.

  44. Ibid., 191. The translation is from Denon, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt, 2:295.

  45. Ibid., 197–99.

  46. Napoleon secretly fled Egypt because of many military defeats in September 1799. After Napoleon, General Kléber was appointed as the commander in chief for less than a year before he was assassinated in June 1800. Kléber was succeeded by the General Menou, who was the third and last commander in chief of the campaign, as the French were finally defeated and forced to depart by joint British-Ottoman troops in 1801.

  47. Madiha Dus (ed.), Mukhtarat min Watha’iq al-Hamla al-Faransiyya, 1798–1801 (Cairo: Dar al-Kutub wal-Watha’iq al-Qawmiyya, 2006), 78–82, 87–91, 108–9.

  48. Ibid., 86–91.

  49. Ibrahim, Al-Faransiyyun fi Sa‘id Misr, 136–37.

  50. Ibid., 135–73.

  51. Ibid. About Menou and the Copts, also see Dus, Mukhtarat min Watha’iq al-Hamla al-Faransiyya, 114–15, 116–17.

  52. Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, 3:139–40.

  53. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 50, p. 286, 5 Shawwal 1214, Archival Code 1169–000051, NAE.

  54. Dus, Mukhtarat min Watha’iq al-Hamla al-Faransiyya, 118.

  55. Ibid., 109–33; Khalid Abu al-Rus, “Madinat Isna fil-Qarn al-Thamin ‘Ashr,” PhD dissertation, Cairo University, 2008, 56.

  56. Ibid.

  57. Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:195–97. The translation is from Denon, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt, 2:300–301.

  58. Denon, Voyage dans le Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:233–34.

  59. Dus, Mukhtarat Min Watha’iq al-Hamla al-Faransiyya, 112–13, 136, 144; Jamal al-Din, appendix 10, in al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar fil-Tarajim wal-’Akhbar, 4:433–35.

  60. Jamal al-Din, appendix 15, in al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar fil-Tarajim wal-’Akhbar, 4:439.

  61. Denon, Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Égypte, 2:151–52. The translation is from Denon, Travels in Upper and Lower Egypt, 2:243–44.

  62. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar fil-Tarajim wal-’Akhbar, 4:592–601.

  63. Jamal al-Din, “Mu‘ahadat al-sulh bayna Kilibar wa-Murad Bey,” in al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar fil-Tarajim wal-’Akhbar, 4:301–3; The Annual Register; or, a View of the History of Politics and Literature for the Year 1801 (London: Printed by T. Burton, 1802), 212–17, 225; Louis Adolphe Thires, History of the Consulate and the Empire of France under Napoleon, D. Forbes Campbelle and John Stebbing (trans.) (London: Chatto and Windus, 1893), 1:304–5; Dus, Mukhtarat min Watha’iq al-Hamla al-Faransiyya, 109–10.

  64. Jamal al-Din, “al-Amir Murad Bey,” in al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-athar fil-tarajim wal-akhbar, 4:592.

  65. Edward Lane, An Account of the Manners and Customs of Modern Egyptians: Written in Egypt During the Years 1833, 34, and 35 (London: Charles Knight and Co., 1837), 1:3.

  66. Gabor Agoston and Bruce Masters (eds.), Encyclopedia of the Ottoman Empire (New York: Facts on File, 2009), 462–63.

  67. T.C. Hansard (ed.), The Parliamentary Debate, Forming a Continuation of the Work Entitled “The Parliamentary History of England from the Earliest Period to 1803” (London, 1825), 12:1323–24.

  68. Mémoires sur l’Égypte, 155.

  69. Larrey, Memoirs of Military Surgery and Campaigns of the French Army, 1:370.

  70. ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti, Muzhir al-Taqdis bi Zawal Dawlat al-Faransis (Cairo: Dar al-Kutub wal-Watha’iq al-Misriyya, 1998), 250. The translation is from LaVerne Kuhnke, Lives at Risk: Public Health in Nineteenth-Century Egypt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), 76.

  71. Hansard, Parliamentary Debate, 12:1325–26.

  72. “The Diseases of Egypt, from Observations Made during the British Expedition in That Country under Sir R. Abercromble, K.C.B., in 1801,” Medical Press and Circular, a Weekly Journal of Medicine and Medical Affairs, July–December 1882, 152–53.

  CHAPTER 3: THE PASHA’S SETTLERS, BULLS, AND BANDITS

  1. J.A. St. John, Egypt and Nubia (London: Chapman and Hall, 1845), 378–81.

  2. ‘Ali Mubarak, Al-Khitat al-Tawfiqiyya al-Jadida li-Misr al-Qahira (Cairo: al-Hay’a al-Misriyya al-‘Amma lil-Kitab, 1994), 12:116–17; Afaf Lutfi al-Sayyid Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 133.

  3. See, for example, ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Rafi‘i, ‘Asr Muhammad ‘Ali (Cairo: Dar al-Ma‘arif, 1930); and Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali.

  4. Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha’s Men: Mehmed Ali: His Army and the Making of Modern Egypt (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997). Fahmy also argues against Muhammad ‘Ali intending to build an empire and claims instead that he maintained his position as a loyal viceroy of the Ottoman sultan.

  5. Michael Hechter, Internal Colonialism: The Celtic Fringe in British National Development, 2nd ed. (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 1998).

  6. Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 66; ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar fi-l-Tarajim wa-l-’Akhbar (Cairo: Lajnat al-Bayan al-‘Arabi, 1958–), 7:155–57, 162.

  7. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 7:167. Ibrahim held the position of al-daftardar. Ra’uf ‘Abbas et al. (eds.), Al-’Awamir wa-l-Mukatabat al-Sadira min ‘Aziz Misr Muhammad ‘Ali (Cairo: Dar al-Kutub wa-al-Watha‘iq al-Qawmiyya, 2005–6), 1:1, 23.

  8. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 7:234–35.

  9. Ibid.

  10. Amin Sami, Taqwim al-Nil (Cairo: Matba‘at Dar al-Kutub al-Misriyya, 1936), introduction, p. 128; 2:290.

  11. al-Jabarti, ’Aja’ib al-’Athar, 7:175–76.

  12. Ibid., 7:367.

  13. Helen Anne Rivlin, The Agricultural Policy of Muhammad ‘Ali in Egypt (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1961), 171–74.

  14. Ibid, 171–72; Muhamad Fu’ad Shukri et al., Bina‘ Dawlat Misr Muhammad ‘Ali: Al-Siyasa al-Dakhiliyya (Cairo: Dar al-Fikr al-‘Arabi, 1948), 54.

  15. Fred Lawson, The Social Origins of Egyptian Expansionism during the Muhammad Ali Period (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), 69.

  16. John Bowring, Report on Egypt and Candia, 1840, Addressed to the Right Hon. Lord Viscount Palmerston (London: W. Clowes and Sons, 1840), 67.

  17. ‘Abbas et al., Al-’Awamir wa-l-Mukatabat, 1:435, 439; 2:286–87.

  18. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 7:185, 269; Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 153; Rivlin, Agricultural Policy, 146; ‘Abbas et al., Al-’Awamir wa-l-Mukatabat, 1:240.

  19. Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 149.

  20. See Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 127–28, 145–53; Rivlin, Agricultural Policy, chapter 8; and Shukri et al., Bina‘ Dawlat Misr, 130–51.

  21. ‘Abbas et al., Al-’Awamir wa-l-Mukatabat, 1:75. For the campaigns, see al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, vol. 7.

  22. See ‘Abd al-Rahim ‘Abd al-Rahman ‘Abd al-Rahim, Muhammad ‘Ali wa Shibh al-Jazira al-‘Arabiyya, 1819–1840 (Cairo: Dar al-Kitab al-Jami‘i, 1981), 55–56, 508; and Shukri et al., Bina‘ Dawlat Misr, 55, 130–51.

  23. See Salah Ahmad Haridi, Dawr al-Sa‘id fi Misr al-‘Uthmaniyy, 923/1213–1517/1898. (Cairo: Dar al-Ma‘arif, 1984); and Terence Walz, Trade between Egypt and Bilad As-Sudan (Cairo: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale du Caire, 1978).

  24. Arthur T. Holroyd, Egypt and Mahomed Ali Pacha in 1837: A Letter, Containing Remarks upon “Egypt as It Is in 1837”; Addressed to the Righ
t Hon. Viscount Palmerston. London: James Ridgeway and Sons, 1838., 18.

  25. Quoting Colonel Campbell, the British consul general, in Bowring, Report on Egypt and Candia, 37.

  26. Ibrahim later traveled to the Delta and applied his southern system there. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 7:178, 233.

  27. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 80, Case 41, p. 16, 4 Dhu al-Hijja 1231, NAE.

  28. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 94, Part 1, Case 66, p. 23, end of Dhu al-Qi‘da 1229, NAE.

  29. Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat 94, Part 1, Case 75, p. 27, 6 Dhu al-Hijja 1229, NAE.

  30. See Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 133–35.

  31. al-Jabarti, ‘Aja’ib al-’Athar, 7:481.

  32. Gabriel Baer, “Submissiveness and Revolt of the Fallah,” in Studies in the Social History of Modern Egypt (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1969); Fred Lawson, “Rural Revolt and Provincial Society in Egypt, 1820–1824,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 13 (2) (May 1981): 131–53; Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 133–35.

  33. Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 133–34.

  34. ‘Ali Mubarak, Al-Khitat al-Tawfiqiyya, 12:116–17; St. John, Egypt and Nubia, 381; Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 133.

  35. St. John, Egypt and Nubia, 378–81.

  36. Ibid., 380–81.

  37. Ibid., 379–81.

  38. Ibid., 382.

  39. Khaled Fahmy, “Mutiny in Mehmed Ali’s New Nizami Army, April–May 1824,” International Journal of Turkish Studies 8 (1–2) (2002): 129–38.

  40. St. John, Egypt and Nubia, 382–84.

  41. Ibid.; ‘Ali Mubarak, Al-Khitat al-Tawfiqiyya, 12:116–17; Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali, 133.

  42. ‘Abbas et al., Al-’Awamir wa-l-Mukatabat, 1:130–31, 13 Dhu al-Hijja 1239.

  43. See, for example, Isna Court, Sijill Ishhadat, 1254–56; and Sadir Mudiriyyat, Isna, 1260–1261, both in NAE.

  44. Filib Jallad, Qamus al-’Idara wal-Qada’ (Al-Iskandariyyu: al-Matba‘a al-Bukhariyyah, 1891–), 1:12–15, 1255–56; Zayn al-‘Abidin Shams al-Din Najm, Mu‘jam al-’Alfaz wa-l-Mustalahat al-Tarikhiyya (Cairo: Dar al-Fikr al-‘Arabi, 2006), 29–30 (on ab‘adiyya), 35 (on ‘uhda), 183–84 (on çiftlik).