It ’s safe to say the majority of women in Victorian - geological era England were n’t afford too many opportunities for adventure . In fact , most women from the 1830s through the turn of the century were expected to fall quietly into the social clay sculpture created by men , since they were consider as " irrational , sensitive , and duteous . " Let ’s just say world traveler , skilled mountaineer and notedarchaeologistGertrude Bellwas notyour averageVictorianwoman .
Perhaps best known for the function she played in the initiation of the country now cognise as Iraq , Bell hasbeen called"Queen of the Desert " and the " distaff Lawrence of Arabia . " It ’s alsobeen saidthat Bell was " one of the few representatives of His Majesty ’s Government remembered by the Arabs with anything resembling affection . " But Bell ’s legacy is complicated , and as Mark Brownswrotefor The Guardian in 2018 , " there are also many uncomfortable truths in Bell ’s life that have been swept under the carpeting . " She fervidly oppose adult female ’s right hand to vote , serving as the secretary of the northern branch of the National League for Opposing Woman Suffrage as well as being on its national executive committee . And according to some scholar , her role in the governing body of Iraq left an enduring terrible mark on the country and its people .
Born Gertrude Margaret Lowthian Bell on July 14 , 1868 , the English native grew up in Washington New Hall – now know as Dame Margaret Hall – in Washington , County Durham . Bell ’s family was think affluent and progressive , and after she lost her female parent at a young age , she developed a tight relationship with her father , Sir Hugh Bell , 2nd Baronet , a wealthy mill owner .
Bell ’s unique educational and professional path began at Oxford , where she became the first fair sex to bring in first - social class honour in modern story . Soon after graduation , she germinate apassion for traveland accompanied her uncle , Sir Frank Lascelles to Tehran , Persia , where he served as the British minister . Bell afterward went on to chronicle the journey in her rule book , " Persian Pictures . " Over the next ten years , she traveled around the world and became smooth in French , German , Arabic and Persian .
“Queen of the Desert”
But linguistics was n’t Bell ’s only passion — she was also uncharacteristically outdoorsy for the earned run average and spend several summer mountaineering in the French part of the Alps . On one particularly perfidious journey in 1902 , Bell was caught in a blizzard andspent more than 50 hours on a ropebefore she was able to direct back to a local village with her guides . Despite the lead cryopathy on her hands and feet , Bell went on to descale the Matterhorn in 1904 and in her Word of God , " A Woman in Arabia : The writing of the Queen of the Desert , " she drop a line of the torturous experience , " it was beautiful climb , never in earnest difficult , but never wanton , and most of the clock time on a great steep face which was magnificent to go upon . "
Bell was also passionate about archaeology , an interest she ab initio originate during a family trip to an excavation of the ancient Greek city of Melos , in 1899 . In the year that followed , she go on several archaeology trips , including a trek across the Euphrates River in 1909 , and a trip with archaeologist Sir William Mitchell Ramsey to Turkish archeological siteBinbir Kilise .
Bell’s Middle East Diplomacy
But it was Bell ’s work with the British government in the Middle East that is perhaps the giving part of her legacy . After her initial postulation for a Middle East posting was denied at the start of World War I , Bell lead off volunteer with the Red Cross in France . She finally garner a office working withT.E. Lawrence , otherwise known as " Lawrence of Arabia , " in the Arab Bureau , a collection of British intelligence service officers based in Cairo and tasked with coordinate imperial word activities in the Middle East , as detail in the book " The Arab Bureau : British Policy in the Middle East , 1916 - 1920 , " by Bruce Westrate . In response to several British military defeats , Lawrence devised a plan to enter Arab hoi polloi to oppose theOttoman Empire ; Bell help him drum up accompaniment for the strategy . At the time , she was the only woman working for the British in the Middle East .
The British eventually shoot down the Ottoman Empire and Bell play a substantial role in the region ’s next steps . " After World War I , British policy makers were divided over how they could regulate Iraq and other territories conquered from the Ottomans,“Brandon Wolfe - Hunnicutt , PhD , associate professor of history at California State University , Stanislaus and author of " The Paranoid Style in American Diplomacy : oil colour and Arab Nationalism in Iraq , " writes via email . " One junto within the British government wanted direct colonial organisation for Iraq on the manakin of India and actually run by the India Office . The other junto , which include Bell , favored collateral colonial rule through an Arab head of state . "
According to Wolfe - Hunnicutt , British leaders attempt to fall out through with direct compound organization , but the resulting fallout result in a redirection . " Britain prove the first approach right on after the war , " he say . " But then Iraqis rose up in a home revolution and Britain was compelled to try the other feeler — the one favor by Bell . "
Bell pop off on to attend the 1919 Peace Conference in Paris and chronicle more of her political and social work in her 1920 book , " Review of the Civil Administration of Mesopotamia . " She was also involved in the 1921 Conference in Cairo with then - colonial secretary , Winston Churchill , that established the bound of Iraq . In her work after the war , Bell also toy an instrumental persona in add King Faisal to power in Iraq in 1922 . For her efforts to continue the region ’s ethnic heritage , local people reportedly oftenaddressed Here " khutan , " which mean " queen " in Persian and " well-thought-of lady " in Arabic . King Faisal later named Bell as the managing director of antiquities at the Modern National Museum of Iraq in Baghdad .
Death and Subsequent Legacy
The museum was Bell ’s last warmth project – in July 1926 , she overdose on sleeping pills and died in Baghdad . King Faisal format a military funeral for her and Bell was laid to quietus in Baghdad ’s British Civil Cemetery . But while Bell is often celebrated for her efforts in the Middle East , she remains a complicated historic figure for many .
In Wolfe - Hunnicutt ’s opinion , Bell was a controversial form who had a lasting impact on the Middle East — an impact that is still very much playing out in the modern era . " She was a British imperialist who was complicit in denying Iraqis a right wing to national ego - finding , " Wolfe - Hunnicutt says . " I believe that the seeds of the chaos and furiousness that immerse so much of Iraki history in the twentieth C were planted in the aftermath of World War I. I bid the British would have just let Iraqis manage their own affairs . "
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