Background

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Sourcebook

This information would be generally known or easily researched by the PCs, it is intended to provide some flavour and context to our adventures.

A Promise Broken
At the end of the war the British conveniently forgot many of the promises that had been made to the Egyptians, and returned to governing Egypt as a colonial outpost in Africa. Understandably, the locals were not at all happy with this state of affairs. Chief among the dissidents was Saad Zaghlul Pasha, a minister in the government from 1906- 1913, when he was elected to the National Assembly. At the end of the war he began to lobby for Egyptian self determination, and as a consequence of the militant activities of his followers (street marches, general strikes, and violence against the British) in March 1919 was exiled from Egypt.
Street marches continued in early 1920, with all Europeans advised to stay indoors and armed guards stood at the doors of all hotels. Throughout 1920 ministers sympathetic to the British were bombed, British officers and troops were assassinated and there were violent riots in most towns and villages. In May 1921 there were violent riots in Alexandria following the shooting of Egyptians by police in Tanta. Windows and heads were broken, shops looted and unaccompanied Europeans attacked. British troops eventually managed to clear the streets and restore order.
In 1922 Zaghlul was allowed to return to Egypt, but further riots broke out wherever he spoke to crowds. On 23 December 1922 he was once again deported, this time to the Seychelles. More English officers and tourists were killed in November 1922, and political murders averaged two per month throughout 1922.
Self Rule
On 28 February 1922 Lord Allenby, the British High commissioner in Egypt from April 1919 to mid-1925, declared the sovereignty of Egypt, and Sarwat Pasha was made the leader of the government. Prince Fuad of Egypt was declared King. In December 1922 there was a call for a boycott of Englishmen and all items of British manufacture until Zaghlul was permitted to return from exile. This resulted in further street riots, and the leaders of the call were imprisoned. More murders of Englishmen followed In January 1923 Swat was replaced by Tewfic Pasha Nessim, who was himself replaced in April 1923 by Yehia Pasha Ibrahim. On 19 April 1923 the constitution was published, along with a bill of indemnity for all involved in the uprisings. Zaghlul was free to return, which he did in September. The elections in September 1923 saw Zaghlul Pasha elected Prime Minister, and he then travelled to London to talk to the British parliament. On arriving at Victoria Station he was the target of an unsuccessful assassination attempt, the news of which caused minor street riots in some parts of Cairo. He returned to Egypt in October 1924.

In September 1924 the Egyptian army rioted at the Atbara barracks, with widespread looting and pillaging. On 19 November 1924 the Governor General of the Sudan, Sir Lee Stack, was assassinated by Egyptian nationalists in Cairo, just outside the British Residency near the Garden City. At his funeral, Allenby reprimanded the Egyptian government, and shortly afterwards Zaghlul resigned as Prime Minister. All Egyptian military units were ordered out of the Sudan by the British in retaliation. The new (appointed) Prime Minister was Ahmed Pasha Ziwar. New elections were held in the spring of 1925, and Zaghlul was re-elected Prime Minister by a substantial majority. Ziwar called for King Fuad to dissolve the parliament and to investigate corruption in the election. Ziwar then left for a holiday in Europe. Lord Allenby ended his term in mid-1925 and was replaced by Lord Lloyd in October of that year. By November 1925 there was still no parliament or true Prime Minister, although Ziwar was still the acting PM. New elections were held in 1926. Zaghlul announced that he would not accept the leadership, but when his party, the Wafd (Al- Wafd Al-Misri, 'The Egyptian Delegation"), won by a landslide he rapidly changed his mind. The terrorism trial of two Wafd party members closely associated with Zaghlul shortly after the elections resulted in both of them being acquitted. This caused a general outcry; the British judge resigned from the case, and the King dismissed Zaghlul as Prime Minister, and appointed Adli Yeghen in his place. King Fuad visited England in July 1927 and a draft treaty was proposed between Britain and Egypt.

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Currency :

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Egyptology

In the first half of the 20th century some outstanding archaeological discoveries were made: Howard Carter uncovered the tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922; In 1925, the anthropologist Henry Field, accompanied by Breasted, visited the tomb and recalled the kindness and friendliness of Carter. He also reported how a paperweight given to Carter's friend Sir Bruce Ingham was composed of a mummified hand with its wrist adorned with a scarab bracelet marked with, "Cursed be he who moves my body. To him shall come fire, water and pestilence." Soon after receiving the gift, Ingram's house burned down, followed by a flood when it was rebuilt.[15]
Howard Carter was entirely skeptical of such curses.[16] He did report in his diary a "strange" account that in May 1926 he saw jackals of the same type as Anubis, the guardian of the dead, for the first time in over thirty-five years of working in the desert.[17]



Statue of Ramses II: Temple of Luxor


Luxor - early 1900s..




Entrance to the temple at Luxor

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Chicago House, Luxor