An Arabian Princess Between Two Worlds

Princess Salme, daughter of Sa'id ibn Sultan, ruler of Oman and Zanzibar, was born in Zanzibar in 1844. After becoming acquainted with the German merchant Rudolph Heinrich Ruete she fled to Aden in 1866 where she was baptized with the Christian name Emily and where she married Ruete. In Hamburg, three children were born. Her husband died in 1870 and after that she lived in several cities in Germany. In 1885 and again in 1888 she went back to Zanzibar. Between 1889 and 1914 she lived in Jaffa and Beirut, and afterwards in Germany. She died in Jena in 1924. This work contains a short biography of Princess Salme/Emily Ruete and of her son Rudolph Said-Ruete, an English translation of her "Memoirs" and an English version of her other writings, unpublished so far: "Letters Home", "Sequels to the Memoirs" and "Syrian Customs and Usages".