Farewell to a Dubai princess
Sad news today, with the death of a lady most people will never have heard of.
So hear it now. Sheikha Sanaa bint Mana bin Rashid Al Maktoum was an amazing woman, one of the greatest Grand Old Dames of Dubai. In keeping with custom here, she lived completely out of the public eye. But she was known to have a powerful influence in the Ruler's Court, and was greatly respected and admired.
Assuming these scant references equate, Sheika Sanaa was the daughter of Shaikh Mani bin Rashid, a former education minister described as a "moderniser" by Lienhardt in Shaikhdoms of Eastern Arabia and an "enlightened philanthropist" by Michael Field in The Merchants: The Big Business Families of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. In the 1930s Mani had his young daughter taught to read and write, then an extremely rare thing for women. Lienhardt claims that this accomplishment was "lacked by any of the other shaikhly ladies of Dubai" even in the 1960s.
Sheikha Sanaa married the brother of Dubai's former ruler Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed al Maktoum, according to Adam Smith's Paper Money. The book describes her as a "high-spirited woman who once shot her husband's fourth wife." She also built up a thriving taxi fleet.
So hear it now. Sheikha Sanaa bint Mana bin Rashid Al Maktoum was an amazing woman, one of the greatest Grand Old Dames of Dubai. In keeping with custom here, she lived completely out of the public eye. But she was known to have a powerful influence in the Ruler's Court, and was greatly respected and admired.
Assuming these scant references equate, Sheika Sanaa was the daughter of Shaikh Mani bin Rashid, a former education minister described as a "moderniser" by Lienhardt in Shaikhdoms of Eastern Arabia and an "enlightened philanthropist" by Michael Field in The Merchants: The Big Business Families of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. In the 1930s Mani had his young daughter taught to read and write, then an extremely rare thing for women. Lienhardt claims that this accomplishment was "lacked by any of the other shaikhly ladies of Dubai" even in the 1960s.
Sheikha Sanaa married the brother of Dubai's former ruler Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed al Maktoum, according to Adam Smith's Paper Money. The book describes her as a "high-spirited woman who once shot her husband's fourth wife." She also built up a thriving taxi fleet.
Labels: history
16 Comments:
do we get a day from work in dubai...
day off?
and more on this part of the wikipedia article on Dubai:
(in the ruler's paragraph):
15 April 1929 - 18 April 1929 Sheikh Mani ibn Rashid
It seems that Sheik Mani was ruler for 3 days...
after and before Sheik Saaed, Sheik Rashid's father, is mentioned as the ruler. I wonder what happened.
20 June, 2006 0
Chillmeister - entries I did on 25 September 2004 and 17 March 2005 have a little more information.
Never heard of her until this post. What about the shooting? What taxi fleet?
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I'm surprised there was anything in the papers, usually only stories about the men are printed.
Sheikha Sanaa was the local partner of the first company I worked for here, way back, and I met her a number of times. She was a formidable lady.
Hey SD your wish came true. http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060620/wl_mideast_afp/uaeislamjusticebangladesh_060620092856.
Eh. Damn links. Anyway, the Bangladeshi guy who was sentenced to stoning for having an affair will now be jailed and deported instead.
I heard a great story about her. Apparently she had a palace next to Sheikh Mo's, on the beach I think, and every day she got her gardeners to move the fence a little bit and encroach on his garden, eventually he would notice and get mad with her and she would play the "how could you possibly think I would do something dishonorable like that" card. I really hope its a true story!
sad to hear about her deminse...although her descriiption far is very amusing :-)
I hereby confess that I don't read SD since so long, therefore I couldn't possibly knew you posted on the subject. But after reading I still have to say that information is fragmented and confused: is Mani the one who got killed in that famous dinner by Rashid and his men? Is Saana the 13 y.o. which then goes to marry Rashid's younger brother?
Was Mani the ruler at that time?
Did you post anything on Usher Bin Jumma Bin Makhtoum Al Makhtoum?
chillmeister - I truly don't know for certain, it's just stuff I pieced together. I was hoping someone would step in and correct if necessary, but no one seems to know very much.
I haven't heard of Usher Bin Jumma - who is he?
chillmeister....wasn't it shk saeed's men that killed the folks at the wedding dinner and not shk rashid's men????
Anon: possibly both? And who said: "wedding"? Are we all getting arrested, next?
Thanks so much for your comments, my_opinion, it is so hard to find people who actually know stuff about this.
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