Cairo- "On the night of Friday 9 Rabi' al-Awwal 1321 AH, corresponding to 5 June 1903, the marriage contract of Hanim, the eldest teenage daughter, to the honorable Ibrahim Ibrahim al-Jazzar, became a friendship of 6 bentō and 3 buntu for the future."

For many Egyptians, the value of this dowry (or dowry) seems unfamiliar and ambiguous, and may be even more confusing if they learn that the previous value, equivalent to more than 52 grams of pure gold, was contained in a marriage contract document concluded 120 years ago in a popular area of Cairo, the Husseiniya area of the Bab al-Shaaria section.

A marriage certificate dating back to 1903 under which the husband paid a dowry equivalent to about 220 grams of gold (Al Jazeera)

The historical document owned by Ahmed Hassan, an amateur collector of Egyptian documents, along with other marriage documents, leads us on a journey through time to the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, to examine an important aspect of the social life of Egyptians in the Khedive era.

Hassan says to Al Jazeera Net that these documents convey a lot of facts about marriage matters in Egypt in that era, especially the value of dowries prevailing at the time, which reached in some decades to about 220 grams of pure gold, which exceeds 660 thousand Egyptian pounds at current gold prices in Egypt.

The average price of a gram of 24-carat gold – at the close of trading last Saturday – 3028 pounds (the dollar is officially equal to about 31 pounds), while the average price of a gram of 21 carat (the most popular in Egypt) settled at 2650 pounds, after recording on Friday a record price of 2800 pounds.

While the glitter of gold captures the hearts of girls looking to the "net" (a suitor's gold ornament that is currently part of the dowry provider), the crazy rise in gold prices, along with the cost of establishing a marital home, leads to the reluctance of many young men to marry.

The significant and increasing rise in gold prices prompted the launch of a number of initiatives to abandon the requirement to provide a gold "network" or only to provide a symbolic "network", and write the rest of the value in what is known as the list of marital movables.

Calls in Egypt demand the abolition of the gold network and the sufficiency of a symbolic gift (Reuters)

Back to the past

Among the dozens of documents presented by the Egyptian amateur on Al Jazeera Net, we selected some documents that show the multiplicity of currencies used in the payment of dowry, and carry clear discrepancies in the value of the dowry between the virgin bride and the bride (lost her husband by death or divorce), and its difference according to the marital status of the couple, and the percentage of what is submitted as urgent for dowry compared to what remains in the husband's custody.

The oldest of these documents dates back to 21 Muharram 1294 AH, corresponding to February 4, 1877, and bears the title "Marriage Permission Paper" issued by the Sharia Court in the Abu Homs Center in the Beheira District, documenting the marriage of Officer Ahmed Effendi Ghoneim, "Second Lieutenant Asaker Sawari in the Beheira District's Army," to his fiancée, Maryam, the woman who is clothed with the daughter of the honorable Ahmad al-Nana'i.

According to the document, the urgent dowry amounted to 800 piasters of silver currency at the price of that day, and the deferred 400 piasters in the mentioned currency, meaning that the value of the dowry is equivalent to 1680 grams of silver carat 0.833 (the weight of the silver shark in that period 1.4 grams).

A marriage permit document dating back to 1877 showing the value of the dowry in silver coins (Al-Jazeera)

Golden Pony

Unlike the first document, the dowry was converted into gold coins in other documents titled "Registration of a Marriage Contract Document" and the seal of "Haqqaniya glasses" dated 1317 AH / 1899 AD and 1321 AH / 1903 AD, and varied between the Frankish pound (English pound) and the French gold currency "Bento".

This shift is in line with Egypt's economic conditions at that period, after the issuance of the Monetary Reform Law in 1885, which approved the Egyptian gold pound as the country's unified currency, weighing 8.5 grams of 0.875 carat, equivalent to 7.43 grams of pure gold.

However, the issuance of the Egyptian pound in those years was not enough, opening the door for other currencies to enter the transactions of Egyptians, such as the English pound (7.99 grams of 0.9167 carat gold, or about 7.32 grams of pure gold), and the Egyptian government set a legal exchange rate of 97.5 Egyptian piasters (pound 100 piasters).

It also allowed the circulation of the "pinto currency", which is equivalent to the French lira, which is equal to 20 gold francs, and weighs in that period 6.45 grams of 0.900 carat gold (about 5.8 grams of pure gold), and in the early 20th century the Egyptian government estimated the value of the bento at 77.15 Egyptian piasters, provided that its circulation is optional, according to Latifa Salem in her book "Egypt in World War I."

Sooner and later

The dowries varied in that period, we find in the document, which bears the date of 10 Rabi' al-Awwal 1321 AH, that "Muhammad Effendi Sadiq Anbar" Al-Khoja (teacher) at Qena School paid 20 pounds Frankish as a friendship for his firstborn fiancée six Nazla bint Ahmed Effendi Saeed and kept 10 pounds as a back friendship (that is, the friendship is equivalent to 220 grams of gold).

As for Salama Hosni bin Hosni, he paid the father of his fiancée, Zainab bint Salem, whom he married on 14 Jumada al-Thani 1317 AH corresponding to October 19, 1899, 10 Frankish pounds (73.2 grams of gold) as a dowry provider and kept his debt like her until one of the two terms (divorce or death).

The amount of 12 pounds Frankish (about 88 grams of gold) was repeated as a friendship in two marriages, of which 8 pounds were paid sooner and 4 pounds remain later in both cases: the first in Qalyubia governorate on 6 Jumada al-Thani 1317 AH corresponding to October 11, 1899 and paid by Muhammad al-Sha'ir bin Muhammad to his fiancée Amna bint Sayed Murad from Nagaa al-Arab in Assiut.

The second marriage was in Bab al-Sha'aria in Cairo on 9 Rabi' al-Awwal 1321 AH corresponding to June 5, 1903, and was paid by Hussein Ali Nawar al-Dakhakhni to his eldest fiancée, Hanem Ibrahim Deif.

The bento is a French gold coin used by Egyptians in their financial dealings in the 19th and early 20th centuries (Al Jazeera)

Although the friendship of the maiden was similar in the previous two marriages, several historical studies indicate that the friendship of the garment was often less than the friendship of the firstborn, especially if the social conditions between them were similar.

This is shown in the documents of two cases, as they married on two consecutive days in the same area (Husseiniya in Bab al-Sha'riya), and one of them was a virgin, Hanem bint Hassan al-Watar, who received 6 daughters of urgent friendship and 3 daughters, while Al-Theeb Siddiqa bint Hassan Muwafi married Hassan Ali Amer al-Halawani on an urgent friendship of 3 daughters and 1.5 daughters.