pictured: Gertrude from a drawing by Sargent.Bell journeyed to the Ottoman Empire and began to work with the archaeologist and New Testament scholar Sir William M. Ramsey. Their excavations in Binbirkilise were chronicled in A Thousand and One Churches. In January 1909, she left for Mesopotamia. She visited the Hittite city of Carchemish, mapped and described the ruin of Ukhaidir and finally went to Babylon and Najaf. Back in Carchemish, she consulted with the two archaeologists on site. One of them was T. E. Lawrence.
Her 1913 Arabian journey was generally difficult. She was the second foreign woman after Lady Anne Blunt to visit Ha'il.
In 1927, a year after her death, her stepmother Dame Florence Bell published two volumes of Bell's collected correspondence written during the 20 years preceding World War I. Bell, Gertrude (1927). Bell, Florence, ed. The Letters of Gertrude Bell. London. Volume 1 | Volume 2
Gertrude Bell | 4 Letters and a Diary Entry from Konia
Mavi Boncuk |
"It took us an hour and a half to reach the British civil cemetery in Baghdad, but when we finally found Gertrude Bell's[1] grave it made our journey - through security checkpoints and scorching heat - worthwhile.
Ever since the political turbulence that followed the overthrow of King Faisal II in 1958, access to the cemetery has been restricted and the site itself suffers from neglect.
Ali Mansur, whose family have looked after the cemetery since 1930, unlocked the gates to let us inside.
He said: "Miss Bell hasn't been forgotten", pointing to the shrubs and flowers that surround her grave, which is marked with the inscription: "Gertrude Margaret Lowthian Bell, Oriental Secretary to the High Commissioner for Iraq. Died in Baghdad, 12th July 1926."SOURCE
"In her numerous letters home Mrs Bell gives tantalising glimpses of life in 1920s Iraq - of bathing in the river, afternoon tea with the king and of 'classifying seals' at Baghdad's new archaeological museum, which she founded. In her last letter home to her parents, on June 30 1926, she wrote: "I often wonder how the old Babylonians, with whom I now feel such a close connection, passed their summer. Much as we do, I daresay, but without our ice and electric fans which add immensely to the amenities of existence."
In the letters, however, one senses an undercurrent of loneliness. Two weeks later Mrs Bell took an overdose of sleeping pills. She was 58."SOURCE
Can Werner Herzog’s Gertrude Bell biopic Queen of the Desert do justice to its incredible subject? SEE ARTICLE
[1] Gertrude Margaret Lowthian Bell, CBE (14 July 1868 – 12 July 1926) was an English writer, traveller, political officer, administrator, spy and archaeologist who explored, mapped, and became highly influential to British imperial policy-making due to her knowledge and contacts, built up through extensive travels in Greater Syria, Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, and Arabia. Along with T. E. Lawrence, Bell helped support the Hashemite dynasties in what is today Jordan as well as in Iraq.
She played a major role in establishing and helping administer the modern state of Iraq, utilising her unique perspective from her travels and relations with tribal leaders throughout the Middle East. During her lifetime she was highly esteemed and trusted by British officials and given an immense amount of power for a woman at the time. She has been described as "one of the few representatives of His Majesty's Government remembered by the Arabs with anything resembling affection".