From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Raya and Sakina (:ريا و سكينة ), 's most infamous, began killing women in the neighborhood of in the early days of the 20th century. The were plagued by increasing reports of missing women.
Common details in the reports included the missing person's gender (all were females), the missing women were known to be wearing, and were known to be carrying a large amount of money. Another common detail was the report that many of the missing women were last seen with a woman called Sakina. Sakina was questioned several times because of the reports, but she managed to dodge any suspicions about her involvement. On the morning of December 11, 1920 a passerby discovered remains on the side of the; the body was damaged beyond recognition (except for its long ) and was completely dismembered. There was also a piece of black cloth and a striped black-and-white pair of near the body, however, these items did not help with the identification of the remains. In an unrelated incident, at about the same time in December, a man reported finding human remains beneath his floor while digging to fix a water pipe.
Those findings provided the only evidence regarding the in the Labban neighborhood. After investigation, it was found that Raya and Sakina had been a home, where the bodies were buried, at the time when the women and girls disappeared. Raya and Sakina and their husbands were tried for murder. All four were convicted and were on 16 May 1921. Raya and Sakina became the first Egyptian women to be executed by the modern state of Egypt.
Crime scenes Four homes where the crimes had been committed were all located near Mansheya square. Most of the victims were taken in this area. The addresses of the homes:. No.
5 Makorbis Street near the Labban Bakery. 38 Ali Bay Elkebeer street. 6 El Nagah lane. 8 El Nagah lane. Raya and Sakina in the media Inspired by the story of the Raya and Sakina, many books and works of art have been published.
Raya and Sakina a film production from 1953 that stars Negma Ibrahim, Zouzou Hamdy El-Hakim, Samira Ahmed and Berlanty Abdel Hamid, and was directed. Ismail Yasin meets Raya and Sakina a film production from 1955 that stars, Negma Ibrahim, Zouzou Hamdy El-Hakim, Abdel Fattah Qasri and Reyad El Kasabgy, and was directed by Hamada Abdel Wahab. Raya and Sakina a film production from 1983 that stars Sharihan, Younis Shalabi and Hassan Abdeen. Raya and Sakina the theatrical production that starred Sohair El Babli, and Ahmed Bedier. Raya and Sakina, a television series that ran in 2005, it stars Abla Kamel, Somaya El Khashab, Sami Al Adel, Ahmed Maher, Salah Abdallah, and Ryad El Khouly, and was directed by Gamal Abdel Hamid. There was also a television program entitled: Raya and Sakina, presented by Hala Fakher and Ghada Abdel-Razek.
References. Rizk, Dr Yunan Labib.
Retrieved 2007-10-12.
Sakina and Raya In the music video I Egyptian singer Shams' song Ahlan Ezayek, Shams in one scene plays the part of and Concidered to be some of the 20th centuries most ruthless criminals and have inspired the makings of both movies and theatrical plays in their name. In the year 1919 in a poor district of Alexandria called Al-Labban, the two sisters began their murder spree. They had opened several brothel like houses which they ran together. Raya would often be the one going to markets eyeing out the women with the most jewelry on them (in order to steal it) and striking up conversation using some excuse to lure them to their brothels. There both the sisters husbands would help them kill the victims through suffocation and bury them in the back yard. One day in 1920 a man noted the authorities, he had found a skull in the grounds of his house (previously owned by Sakina).
Police began sniffing a trail that literally led them to her sister Raya who was burning unusual amounts of incense in her house. Raya had 2 bodies in her grounds while 15 other bodies were found at Sakinas house.
The victims were all women, mostly married, in the ages 17-50. The death sentence, at that time hanging, had never been given to females previously. However Raya and Sakina broke that trend and were hanged in 1921, along with their husbands and two other helpers. What I find particulary noteworthy about this piece of fascinating and disturbing history is the motivation for previously not issuing the death sentence to women as stated by the Public Prosecutor of that time, Suleiman Ezzat; '.women's crimes generally demand an element of mercy and compassion, such as crimes in which women are driven to kill their husbands' second wives or in which they poison someone who has brought them harm.' D Reb, I am thirsty for fascinating stories and info! Well I highlighted teh law to say basically how they used to reason about women, the classic view of women as passionate irrational beings.
The funny part is, today they use this type of law application on men of honor crimes in eg. Jordan.how twisted.
AWOS, well am no fan of death penalty at all. I just found the story fascinating and also the legal reasoning abt death penalty and women at that time.
Concider yourself EMBRACED! Lol How can I deny a fasting friend lol I absolutely love this tune of hers, what melancholy soul soothing and aching strokes of her violin. Anonymous said.
Sakina (left) and Raya (right). Raya and Sakina (: ريا و سكينة), were two sisters and considered as 's most infamous, they, their husbands and two other men began killing women in the neighborhood of in the early days of the 20th century. The police were plagued by increasing reports of missing women.
Common details in the reports included the missing person's sex (all were females), the missing women were known to be wearing gold jewelry, and were known to be carrying a large amount of money. Another common detail was the report that many of the missing women were last seen with a woman called Sakina. Sakina was questioned several times because of the reports, but she managed to dodge any suspicions about her involvement. On the morning of 11 December 1920, a passerby discovered human remains on the side of the road; the body was damaged beyond recognition (except for its long hair) and was completely dismembered. There was also a piece of black cloth and a striped black-and-white pair of socks near the body, however, these items did not help with the identification of the remains. In an unrelated incident, at about the same time in December, a man reported finding human remains beneath his floor while digging to fix a water pipe. Those findings provided the only evidence regarding the murders in the Labban neighborhood.
After investigation, it was found that Raya and Sakina had been renting a home, where the bodies were buried, at the time when the women and girls disappeared. Raya and Sakina and their husbands were tried for murder. All four were convicted and were on 16 May 1921. Raya and Sakina became the first Egyptian women to be executed by the modern state of Egypt. Crime scenes Four homes where the crimes had been committed were all located near Mansheya Square. Most of the victims came from this area. The addresses of the homes:.
No. 5 Makoris Street near the Labban Bakery. 38 Ali Bay Elkebeer Street. 6 El Negah Lane. 8 El Negah Lane.
Raya and Sakina in the media Inspired by the story of the Raya and Sakina, many books and works of art have been published. Raya and Sakina a film production from 1953 that stars Negma Ibrahim, Zouzou Hamdy El-Hakim, Samira Ahmed and Berlanty Abdel Hamid, and was directed. Ismail Yasin meets Raya and Sakina a film production from 1955 that stars, Negma Ibrahim, Zouzou Hamdy El-Hakim, Abdel Fattah Qasri and Reyad El Kasabgy, and was directed by Hamada Abdel Wahab. Raya and Sakina a film production from 1983 that stars Sharihan, Younis Shalabi and Hassan Abdeen.
Raya and Sakina the theatrical production from 1985 that starred, and Ahmed Bedier. Raya and Sakina, a television series that ran in 2005, it stars Abla Kamel, Somaya El Khashab, Sami Al Adel, Ahmed Maher, Salah Abdallah, and Ryad El Khouly, and was directed by Gamal Abdel Hamid. There was also a television program entitled: Raya and Sakina, presented by Hala Fakher and Ghada Abdel-Razek.
References.
Their murder spree began in November 1919. The public became aware of the serial murders of women only in November of the following year when Al-Ahram newspaper displayed the shocking headline: “Women slaughtered in Labban: 12 corpses unearthed.” The murderers’ confessions revealed that they would drug the victims by offering them a drink, then strangle them, working as a team, each with a specific task: “one of the killers would clamp his hands over the victim’s mouth, another would grab hold of her throat, a third would hold her hands behind her back and the fourth would pin down her feet until she stopped breathing. Abdel-Aal was in charge of holding the feet.”. FULL TEXT (Article 1 of 3): The trial of a band of assassins who murdered women in order to obtain their jewels, and then buried them in the courtyard of a house in Alexandria, trial take place in Cairo soon. The police have arrested the two principals – a slim, small woman, attractive in appearance, named Sekina, and the chief cut-throat, a little blackish man of villainous aspect, called Raya. Their preliminary evidence in Court created a sensation. The woman Sekina entered the box, and after smoothing her hair and draping the folds of her gown to her satisfaction, recited her crimes without the flicker of an eyelid or a change in the calm confidence of her expression.
“I myself have cut the throats of six women,” she began. “My first victim was called Hanem. I leaned over Hanem as if to whisper in her ear. Soon after death had passed.” The second victim came to sell her something.
The killing of this woman was attended to by another member of the band, as Sekina “had to go out to buy some medicine for her sore feet.” She gave the order, and when she returned the victim was stretched on the floor. “Death had passed,” Sekina said again. Her third victim was a young girl she had lured by promising to tell her fortune. As she dealt the cards she made a sign with her eves to an accomplice, and “death passed that way.” This peculiar phrase was used by the murderess in connection with each crime. “After a throat-cutting or smothering we took off the jewellery and searched for the valuables, which were divided.
I had to look sharp to make sure I was not cheated out of my share.” Once she tried to sever her connection with the other murderers, but was unable, to do so, and she was obliged regretfully to take an active part in the earring of “a dear friend’s” throat, for fear of the other members of this horrible society. Details of the disposal of the bodies followed. “‘Death Passed That Way.’ - Murderess Recites Her Crimes.” The Auckland Star (Australia), Apr. FULL TEXT (Article 3 of 3): ALTHOUGH now a modernized and a hybrid sort of a place in the eyes of the average tourist, Alexandria famed city of Alexander the Great and metropolis of Egypt under the Ptolemies once again steps into the limelight this time by reason of the confessions of Sekina Aly Hammam the Woman Bluebeard whose revelations have caused civilized Egypt and all Europe, especially the parts which border on the Mediterranean sea, to experience a sensation of ghastly horror.
Even Paris, jaded and calloused to post-war excesses, is fairly speechless with amazement at the cold-blooded atrocities to which this avaricious Egyptian woman has with indifference admitted authorship. Many a weird and shocking tale has come out of the land of the Caliphs. But never before has Egypt or rather Cairo or Alexandria its two most important centers of population, with the customary large lawless element found in all seaports of the Suez Canal region, supplied any such story of barbarous cruelty and systematized loot. That a woman should have been the directing brain in such an uninterrupted campaign of butchery and wholesale theft makes it all the more abhorrent to the minds of Europeans and Americans, who will also be appalled by the fact that all of the victims nearly four score were women. The story he sends back is almost unbelievable to Americans. His assertions that no Mohammedan takes a woman seriously, that he regards her as merely an ornamental appendage of his household and is not quite satisfied that she has a soul are interesting in the extreme to people of a land which accords woman the highest place in the social scheme and at the same time they throw light upon the unheard of boldness and insensibility of the hired ruffians who could operate to the extent of sending 72 women to death with no other incentive than the few odd bits of jewelry and odd piece of silver they possessed when lured to their doom. It will be, I fear, many years before I can efface the memories of the five houses which I saw partly demolished in an effort to rescue the bodies of 72 girls and young women who had been put to death by various lethal agencies in order that the cupidity of one woman might be satisfied.
It was a grewsome process surpassing all attempts at description at each of which the accused woman was present. Yet not so much as by the flutter of an eyelid did she betray any conception of the enormity of the crimes which she calmly confessed. As, one by one, the bodies of her victims denuded of what cheap finery they had once worn and shorn of all the real and imitation jewelry with which they had once been adorned were brought to light, Sekina Aly Hammam stood by, a shadow of Oriental inscrutability over her coarsened Amazonian features.
At times she seemed bored. Once or twice she broke into a torrent of mixed Egyptian and Arabic oaths and abuse as if wearied at having to stand by and witness verification of matters with which she was already thoroughly cognizant. In custody at present, besides Sekina and her sister Raya, are two other Egyptian women known to the police as Sadah and Haidee, and three men, miserable specimens of the waterfront outcast and alley assassin whose names are not material. The men and the two other women may not pay the extreme penalty for the murders but there is no chance that they will escape altogether. Now that the authorities have finally become keen to the scope of this staggering underworld plot they are bent upon seeing that justice shall be dealt out after the European fashion.
Sekina and Raya will pay the death penalty. They have not yet had formal trial but I am in a position to say it, had they not confessed the evidence against them would be too sweeping. The story alone told by one of the men and women accomplices would be sufficient to convict. I have just said they will go before the executioner.
They will unless some night a jail attendant grows fatigued at the sight of them or tires of answering their calls for some scanty prison comfort. In that case the sisters will be found in their cells next morning lifeless on the stone flooring and their dusky throats slit.
Then it will be given out that two irreligious and ill-begotten daughters of an infidel dog had committed suicide. I learned quite a bit about Egyptian gaols during my stay in Alexandria. The name of the American who upturned all this terrible recital of bloodshed and greed is John Edgar Madden formerly of Akron, Ohio. He came to Egypt on an errand of hydraulic engineering about twelve years ago, and was induced to remain in an advisory capacity to the administration of the Suez Canal and the Nile delta. About six months ago business took Mr. Madden to Alexandria for an indefinite stay.
He engaged an apartment at No 5 Rue Marcoris not far from the Place Mahomet Ali, or as it is known to American tourists, the Grand square Rue Marcoris, is not what might be called a fashionable street for all its proximity to the plaza. Indeed one section of it is distinctly off color and the very house in which Mr. Madden rented an apartment had at one time had a suspicious reputation. Madden knew, so he told me, but as he said there were certain arrangements about the rooms which he liked and as his neighbors probably wouldn’t have any higher respect for him than he was certain he felt for them, he was not going to allow a little thing like the one-time good or bad repute of a building to interfere with his personal case. Whereupon he paid his rent and moved in. Immediately he discovered that his apartment for all its cleaning and renovating suffered from an entirely different aroma than that which marks. Alexandria to the sensitive nostril of every American and European visitor coming within the city gates.
The dominant odor of Alexandria is camel. Few of you Americans have ever sniffed it in all its undiluted puissance. You may remember a visit to the circus and the feeling of faintness as you passed by the camel herd. Or you may have toured the zoological garden and brought away from the camel corral a nose to which you thought you had done violence. These incidents are trifles. One has never realized the might of the camel odor until one has been in Alexandria.
Americans and Englishmen living in Alexandria told me that it was not until they had been in the city six months at the shortest that they were able to ignore the camel smell and the camel taste which assailed them everywhere I can attest that while in Alexandria in every restaurant I entered I tasted camel in the soup, in the butter, in the vegetables, in the water and in the coffee. Never was there any taste or smell similar. Now I know why it is so easy to steal a camel in this country and not be traced. For a nasal expert such as Mr.
Madden had come to be after a twelve-year residence in an odorful community he rapidly sorted out the respective perfumes which greeted him when he took possession of the apartment in Rue Marcoris. He properly classified them and then complained to his landlord that there was one especial pestilential odor which would have to be muffled. The landlord assured him it was nothing but camel and the American made reply by engaging three native laborers and starting a personal examination of the drain pipes. The American, however, had, in his several years residence in this country acquired an excellent insight into the Egyptian character. Knowing that the surest way to spread the news of the discovery and thereby warn the criminal that the police were on his trail would be to appear in the least excited over what had taken place in his abode he concealed from the workmen the fact that he had sent for the authorities. Instead he told the laborers who had done the excavating that he had other similar jobs which he desired done and paying them well sent them away after he had taken their names and addresses. In all countries under the yoke of Islam women occupy a notoriously inferior and degraded position and nowhere is it lower and more degraded than in this particular part of Egypt.
Though universal equality and fraternity are the cardinal principles of the Moslem cult women are altogether excluded from enjoying the benefits of these liberal tenets. All over the East women are the rich mans toys and the poor mans chattels. Whose affair is it anyway if a rich effendi or a poverty-stricken wretch wants a woman put out of the way? Ipswitch whatsup gold premium. Its only a woman! That is the idea here.
It is difficult to predict where the discoveries made by Mr. Madden would have ended had the duty of continuing the inquiry had been let to the inert police force of the city. I should not like to assert bluntly that the case would have been closed with the removal of the eight bodies from the cellar in the Rue Marcoris if it had been left entirely in the hands of the underlings, though I am constrained to this opinion for the reason that the police department of Alexandria is far from being well organized and it is seldom that the under officers take the trouble to report matters of importance to their superiors.
Having unearthed conditions which gave indication of the existence of a defiant band of robbers and cutthroats holding the city at its mercy Mr. Madden undertook to see the matter through. His first step was to learn from his landlord the names of the tenants who had occupied the house before he moved in. With this knowledge he went to the police captain of the Labbane quarter an official of intelligence and a man who takes his position as a guardian of the law with proper seriousness. Madden at first said he was anxious to find these former tenants as he wished to return some property which they had left behind when they moved from the house. A search of the city failed to gain track of them. All that could be ascertained so this police captain one Kareh reported was that the occupants of the house were in the habit of leaving the place at daybreak and not returning until nightfall each evening.
For the next three days the investigation was at a standstill. Kareh had suspected from the first that the house had once been used for improper purposes. With the true oriental idea of the picturesque he disguised himself as a wandering beggar and haunted the wharves and the camel markets working himself into the confidence of the army of petty thieves and outlaws who infest these places.
On the third day of his masquerading one of his disreputable but unwitting confederates pointed out to him on the waterfront a woman who was known to have visited the house in Rue Marcoris under its former occupancy. The disguised police officer approached the woman and on his promise that he would contrive to filch a fat purse somewhere in the course of the afternoon she agreed to meet him at 9 o’clock in the evening.
She named a notorious drinking den in the Labbane quarter as the place of rendezvous. When Kareh went to keep the appointment he was well equipped for the work in hand. To start with he had availed himself of some valuable information at headquarters As in a great many cities in Europe.
Alexandria’s police force had a list of all the undesirable women of the town Kareh found this woman to be well-known as a thief and all-round bad character. It was arranged that Mr Madden also should go to the crooks’ cafe that evening to be on hand in the event that the woman gave trouble. She was waiting when Kareh arrived with plenty of silver pieces to show that his deft fingers had been busy dipping into others pockets.
Therefore he was high in her estimation. As heartless and as startling as these disclosures may appear in print the woman told more details which are not needed here to emphasize the scope of the death ring she and her sister had drawn around the playthings of Alexandria’s night life. Even Kareh accustomed to tales of dark crime was dumb with the shock of the revelations. The woman gave her name as Raya and invited Kareh to visit her. He accepted but before leaving the cafe he excused himself upon the pretense of borrowing some money from a friend whom he had just espied in the room. This friend was the American engineer.
The sequel to the supposed financial transaction was that when Kareh and the woman arrived at No. 38 Rue Aly el Kebir Madden and a detachment of police were waiting for them. When Raya was finally landed in a cell after a fight in which she all but succeeded in driving a dirk into her breast she was placed in solitary confinement.
Her grewsome story was verified in all essentials the next day when Madden had summoned his gang of native laborers found in the house that day alone among them that of a named Bahia Serepta, who, several months before, had vanished from the quarter. Her disappearance had been noticed by the police mainly because a search had been made for her on suspicion of being implicated in the robbery of a ship purser, who had carelessly allowed himself to wander in dangerous quarter after midnight. Bahia was known and her associates for her possession of some solid gold bangl bracelets and anklets, it developed, and in course of events Raya confessed that the girl was choked to death by two hiremen accomplices so she might become the owner of these glittering ornaments. The body of Bahia was found crammed among the cushions of the old sofa as Raya had foretold. Then proceeding along lines which will no doubt impress American readers as ridiculous, if not impossible, the police went about the business of finding Sekina.
They knew she would make no effort to learn from them where Raya had vanished to. All information that the police had stumbled upon across the trail of the murderers was suppressed from the public. By generous wages, Madden was able to tie the tongues of his force of sullen workmen who probably thought the American himself was a criminal and was trying to remove the evidence of this infamy. So while the underworld denizens of Alexandria lived their daily routine in ignorance that a net was being spread throughout the city the police kept on the track.
Raya And Sakina Documentary
What followed contain an element of comedy. Had I not been present to see for myself I would naturally say, as I fancy most of my readers will be moved to feel, that such a ruse as was tried and usefully worked upon the two murderous sisters was entirely too absurd and childish for belief. Those who would doubt, however, are reminded that what I am relating took place is Egypt and that the object of the deception were women who have from birth the the one idea that anything a man wishes to do with them is possible. In company with Mr. Madden I saw the Egyptian equivalent of the famous American “third degree” applied to Sekina and Raya. I have never seen the method in use in America, but I know it can be nothing like this. At first the sisters with dogedness maintained silence.
They broke this silence when a mock flogging was arranged in the adjoining cell. A gigantic negro cracked a bull whip viciously in the air in the next cell while an attendant all but split the prison wall with his agonized shrieks and promises to answer any question he might be asked. A few minutes of this well fabricated uproar and Sekina fell on her knees, beseeching the jailors to tell her why she was being detained.the prefect of police in person told her it was for the purpose of having her tell her it was for the purpose of having her tell the truth about the houses in Rue Marcoris and in Rue Aler Bey Kebir. Sekina responded that she knew nothing. She admitted having visited the house in Rue Marcoris on two occasions to call on her friend, the wife of a tailor. Kareh at this point introduced his trump card.
In the house where Raya lived he had found a woman’s flannel undervest richly embroidered with multicolored silken threads sewed in the lining of this vest were bank notes to the value of 160 Egyptian pounds. At a signal from the prefect a veiled figure led into the cell. To all appearances it was a magician accredited with with clairvoyance.
This faker broke into a whirling dance after the manner of a dervish, falling apparently from exhaustion at the feet of Raya. As he did so he produced from the folds of his robes the flannel vest.
Both women shrank from the sight of it. Hoarse gasps of fear came from their lips as the magician spread the vest on the stone floor at their feet and toughed it with his forehead three times. When he arose, he drew from his skirts a knife which Kareh also had found in the house of many deaths and with the weapon he carefully slit away the lining where was concealed the Egyptian money. He counted it into equal parts, which he next solemnly handed to the sisters. Sekina said that her murderous operations within the last year had netted her no less than 8,000 pounds.
She told where her jewels which she had purchased with some of her spoils were hidden. Raya was no less voluble. She described one after another the death scenes of their miserable prey. They gave directions as to where different bodies were interred. They enumerated the methods by which various women were put to death, explaining that some were strangled, some stabbed, some attacked from behind with bludgeons and still others slain by choloroform or arsenic.
The favorite method, they admitted, was by strangulation. Moreover, the sisters gave the names of the miserable cutthroats whom they employed, and Sekina capped the mountain of atrocities by producing a notebook in which she kept accurate entries of the amounts in cash and in gems realized from the corpses and the sums each had cost her in miserly fees to the executioners. Most of the murders, it was shown, were done in the three houses already located, but Sekina admitted that she rented two other rooms in other sections of the city, one in the Rue des Sultans and one in the Rue Ghawazee – an alley rather than a street, taking its name from the number dance-halls which fringe its curb. She seldom slept in these rooms but she carried keys to them in case she encountered a subject of such affluence that a speedy death was advisable. No bodies, however, were found buried beneath these two houses. Women slain there were hidden for a day or two while a guard was placed at the door to see that no one entered, and then by night the bodies were removed to the cellars of one of the other houses and thrown in the hurriedly constructed trench on top of the other mutilated forms. Sekina told the police that the first murder she had committed was done at the suggestion of a tailor who had been on friendly terms with her sister Raya.
The wife of a rich carpenter had sent a coat to another shop in Rue des Soers. He proposed that they both go to the other shop for the garment and the woman acquiesced.
The tailor, before starting out, communicated with Sekina, who apparently by chance met him and the carpenter’s wife on their way to the stop in cafe. His invitation was acted upon and the three had glasses of cognac. Presently the tailor, by a prearrangement, announced that he would go to the other shop for the coat asked that the women await his return. While he was gone, Sekina related, she persuaded her drunken dupe to accompany her home under the pretense of looking at a quantity of silk which she intimated had come into her hands from underground channels.
Together they walked to the house in Rue Marconis, from which the carpenter’s wife never came out. A glass of drugged wine sent the woman into sleep, during which Sekina choked her to death with her bony but powerful fingers. The tailor returned to the house later in the evening and he and Sekina dismembered the body and buried it in the basement. It was so easy a job and the profits so huge, when one considers the oriental value placed on the life of a mere woman, the original investment in this instance, that Sekina directly had the notion of going into strangulation as a steady business. Her sudden accession to wealth aroused the suspicions of her sister, however, and in the course of a few days she wilted under the incessant questioning and admitted the slaying.
Then, according to Sekina, Raya mentioned a woman acquaintance who seemed to be a promising prospect in a new business. The one marked for death was a pretty Arabian girl who was living in the Labbano quarter under the lavish patronage patronage of an elderly Englishmen. The sisters represented to the girl that some tourists with whom they had become acquainted in a cafe had planned a trip to Cairo and needed one other girl to complete the party.
The little Arabian was won over by the opportunity to break the monotony of an evening away from her master and consented to go on the mythical excursion. She did more; she told her protector of the party, refraining, however, from mentioning the tourists, and obtained his permission to be absent for three days. What had happened, though, was this: The sisters coaxed the girl into putting on some costly jewelry and to wear her most expensive attire.
When she went to the home of Sekina to meet her new friends she was seized as she got in the door, her arms pinioned behind her and a gag placed between her teeth. Next she was roped upon a lounge and the sisters stood over her teeth. Next she was roped upon a lounge and sisters stood over her with cloths saturated in chloroform which they pressed over her mouth and nose. It was a painless death, though certain. After the girl had ceased breathing they robbed her of all valuables, taking even the silk stockings and richly embroidered underwear. The body was chopped up with a hatchet, this on the word of the tailor, Hazballah, who expects immunity from the death sentence in return for his candid story.
In respect to women, Egypt today is, as has been said, as benighted as it was in the darkest of ages. The beat that can be said of Alexandria is that it is a city of memories. It was in Alexandria that St.
Mark suffered martyrdom for his teaching of the gospel of Christ and it was in Alexandria that Athanasius did battle with the Arian heretics. Later it was in Alexandria that Greek culture centered where were gathered the greatest intellects of the age. It was in Alexandria that a woman once ruled supreme – Cleopatra, “vainquerer dee vainqueurs du monde” – where this entertaining siren held Antony in willing bondage while Octavius was preparing his legions to crush the Roman. And it is here that the native values to or a woman at zero. “The worst of this deplorable state of things,” so has written Mr.
Stanley Lane-Poole, a British Egyptologist of wide reputation, “is that there seems no reasonable prospect of improvement. The Mohammedan social system is so thoroughly bound up with the religion that it appears an almost hopeless task to attempt to separate the two.
As long as the Mohammedan religion exists, the social life with the which it has unfortunately become identified will probably survive; and whilst the latter prevails in Egypt we can not expect the higher results of civilization.”.