On a list of inspiring women in history, Gertrude Bell should sit pretty close to the top. Born in England in 1868, Gertrude Margaret Lowthian Bell’s accomplishments are enough to awe even the biggest overachiever. She was described by her stepmother as “scholar, poet, historian, archaeologist, art critic, mountaineer, explorer, gardener, naturalist, distinguished servant of the State. Gertrude was all of these, and was recognized by experts as an expert in them all.”
As the eldest daughter of one of England’s richest families, Bell was well-educated, first at home, and then at prestigious schools. In 1886 she became one of the first women to graduate from Oxford University, earning a first class honors degree in Modern History in just two years. She was 17-years-old.
After leaving Oxford and finding herself ‘unmarriageable’ in English society, she decided to travel to Persia, to visit an uncle in Tehran. Bell taught herself to speak fluent Farsi and Arabic, and – clearly putting into practice the idea that once you are fluent in one other language, it’s easier to learn others – was also fluent in French and German, and spoke Italian and Turkish. She spent the next decade traveling extensively throughout Europe and the Middle East.
In Switzerland, she recorded new mountaineering paths, becoming one of the best mountaineers of her age. As its first conqueror, along with her guides, the Gertrudspitz in the Bernese Alps was named after her in 1901. Not all of her mountaineering exploits were so successful; she spent two days clinging to a rope on a sheer cliffside after being caught in a blizzard in 1902 and suffered frostbite to her hands and feet. Two years later, she called an end to her mountaineering expeditions after a successful ascent of the Matterhorn.
Bell returned to the Middle East and published narrations of her trips, a translation of Hafiz’s poetry, then journals about her travels through Damascus, Jerusalem, and Beirut. She chronicled the larger part of A Thousand and One Churches, about her time working on an excavation in Turkey, and wrote The Palace and Mosque of Ukhaidir: a Study in Early Mohammadan Architecture. In Turkey and Mesopotamia she collaborated on archaeological projects, meeting T.E. Lawrence – the famed Lawrence of Arabia – on a dig in Carchemish. Whilst building relationships with sheiks, the liberties afforded to her did not go unnoticed. Being a western woman of privilege meant that she traveled with a freedom and status which was not shared by many of those she helped. Indeed, it did not even give her the means to help herself back in Britain, where she felt the brunt of society’s misogyny.
Having spent so many years traveling back and forth across the deserts, and having fostered strong relationships of her own in the pursuit of her obsession with the Middle East, Bell joined the British intelligence. In 1915 she was sent to Cairo, to work at what was known as the Arab Bureau. A year later she was moved to Basra, and then in 1917 to Baghdad. She worked with Lawrence as a liaison officer, creating alliances with Arab tribes.
After the first world war ended Bell remained in Baghdad and became Oriental Secretary for the High Commissioner in Iraq. She was the only woman present at Winston Churchill’s 1921 Cairo Conference. The provinces of Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul were seen to be too unstable to form an independent national state of their own, without some support from the British administration, though Bell believed completely in the possibility of an independent Iraq.
Bell helped Faisal bin al-Hussein bin Ali al-Hashemi to establish himself as king of Iraq – giving her the nickname ‘Kingmaker’ and helping to create the Hashemite dynasty, and subsequently, the modern state of Iraq. Her standing was reflected in the titles she was given; she was frequently addressed as ‘Khutan,’ translating as ‘queen’ or ‘respected lady’ in Persian and Arabic. With her knowledge of the area, Bell was given the task of mapping out the borders of what would become Iraq, as well as working with the High Commissioner, Sir Percy Cox, to create policies for the new state. Before taking the throne, Faisal had never been to Iraq, and Bell toured his new kingdom with him, introducing him to sheiks, teaching him their lineages, and assisting British diplomats in creating a stable structure for the new government. Her part in the creation of a new nation was instrumental, and is perhaps more evident now, a century on.
Bell stayed in Baghdad for the rest of her life, working to fund and open an archaeological museum, and suggested that relics should not be moved to Europe, but should stay in the countries they were discovered in. It was a point she had been trying to make throughout her career in archaeology, but one she became vehemently strict about. Her steadfastness regarding archaeological curation paid off, and she was appointed Iraq’s Director of Antiquities. Today, the collections at The National Museum of Iraq are considered to be some of the most important in the world – though thousands of items were looted or damaged after the US invasion of Iraq in 2003.
In July 1926, plagued by ill-health, Gertrude Bell died in an apparent suicide at her home in Baghdad. She is buried in the British Cemetery in Baghdad, where she was laid to rest draped in the British and Iraqi flags. Her letters were published posthumously, with edits and notes added by her stepmother. They paint a vivid picture of a woman who was both completely a product of her time, but also years ahead of it.
