Never Teach Your Concubine to Read

He called her Lotus Flower when his men brought her to him. She was young, only fifteen, but Persian women did not marry late. She wasn’t really scared. An old Auntie had been at court and lived in the harem to wait on the concubines. She had told Spring (now Lotus Flower) many stories about what it was like to be the favorite of the Sultan. She also told her what it was like for the women who were no longer favored by His Highness. Auntie Nessie told her about the intrigues the women engaged in, the jealousies, the plots, all designed either to put a woman back on top in the harem hierarchy or to win back the attentions of the Glorious Leader. Some of the women were mothers of the sultan’s children so he paid them respect, even if he did not still find them desirable. Some women had to share the sultan if his affections happened to overlap. When the old Sultan died all the concubines were sent to other houses and their servants were retired. If the mothers had daughters, their daughters must go with them.

The new Sultan was relatively young and quite handsome. Lotus had fallen in love with him and he with her. He cherished her, dressed her lavishly, gave her a luxurious chamber that opened to an exotic garden with a small pond, intricate mosaic walls and colorful birds. Adon, the Sultan, seemed to delight in appearing with her in public or at palace functions. She was an accomplished dancer, delicate and sensual and she was beautiful, smooth coffee-colored skin with golden highlights, oval face with long glossy brown hair, eyes that needed no kohl, and lips that were made for staining. She was unblemished and untouched, and he married her right away. He called her Flower after they were wed.

The Sultan’s chamber was large, floored in sand colored marble to match the walls and full of light. In the chamber was a comfortable bed, big and welcoming. Chairs were in a circle near a fireplace. Rugs adorned the floors, painted birds adorned the walls. Adon could not get enough of Flower, but he started to worry that he was possessed, that she had “woman’s magic.” He would be so loving and then he would turn cold and leave her while he took care of his kingdom’s business. He was more often loving than moody but still Flower did not get with child for several years. He loved that she wasn’t a mother because she stayed so youthful, but he was angry that she wasn’t a mother because, again, he thought she might be a witch. Persians were very superstitious. Even so he did not take any other women into his bed and eventually she did find herself with child.

The Sultan celebrated with his captains and warriors. He bought her special foods and fruits, sweets of every kind, especially the honey nut nougats that she loved. He placed his hand on his child inside her and looked at her small bulge lovingly. But he would no longer enter her and after a while of lounging together lovingly intertwined he sent her back to her own chamber. He waited until the child was born; it was a girl and then he left to raid a neighboring king who was trying to dispute his eastern boundary. When he returned, he wanted her more than ever and Flower returned to his bed. She became pregnant again and he treated her as well or better than the first time. The child was a boy. She had three more children in quick succession, all boys. She could see the toll it was taking on her figure and her health. She was ready to stop having children, but she still wanted to be the Sultan’s favorite concubine.

And she was, until the day his Vizier brought home a girl so beautiful the Sultan just could not take his eyes off her. She was from somewhere to the north and had light skin and blue eyes and hair the color of sunlight. She was also terrified and untamed. She didn’t shrink, she fought against the Sultan’s advances and hissed and constantly tried to run away until she was sent to a special room in the harem with bars and Flower was given the task of training her to accept her fate and to become a bride to Adon. Her name was Ellen, and she could not speak like a Persian. But Flower was patient with her and taught her Persian words for things she needed. Flower hated her but was also fascinated by her strength and her spirit. And until she was tamed, Flower still slept in the bed of the Sultan and raised her sons and her daughter as a family.

This girl was smart. She learned Persian quickly, not because she wanted to go to the Sultan’s bed, but because she was so lonely and wanted to make Flower her friend, hoping that Flower might help her escape. She knew that she was intended to replace Flower in the Sultan’s affections and have more children, as children were like riches and no man could ever have enough. The number of women and children he could care for also showed to the world his wealth and power. He loved the boys the best and taught them to ride horses and camels early and he taught them to fight with swords and spears. They played royal games like polo, sometimes on horseback, sometime on the backs of camels. Great tents were erected on the sidelines and there was food and drink and socializing, but women were not welcome. Flower didn’t mind, she worried too much about her sons when she saw the dangerous things these men did on the backs of animals or in mock fights.

Once Ellen learned enough Persian to carry on a rudimentary conversation the Sultan started to come to the harem and woo her. He brought her pretty objects and treats. He told her how beautiful she was. He read her Persian poems which she did not understand, but the meter of the words entranced her. He brought her silky clothing and couches and pillows to make her cell enticing and feminine. She began to look forward to his visits and, noticing his patience, she began to find him attractive and interesting. This was her new life she was coming to terms with, and Flower could see that soon Ellen would replace her.

But Ellen did one truly wonderful thing. She had a book with her, and she taught Flower to read using the book. It was in French, her book, too bad it wasn’t in Persian, but it was a book of poems with a few essays with advice for French women who headed households, big households, royal households. France was known as Gaul at that time. The more Flower learned about how to read the scratches on a page the less jealous she was about being replaced by Ellen. But how could she get more books? How could she learn to read Persian? These thoughts filled Flower’s days. The harem was empty of anyone but Flower and Ellen, various women servants, and Indhir, the old eunuch. Flower had spent plenty of time lately talking with Indhir, and she learned that he had lived far away before he came to Persia and that he was a learned man. He did not know how to read French though, but he did know how to read Latin and he knew how to read Persian. He kept a small library of books in his quarters, and he felt such affection for the Sultana that he agreed to help her learn to read the books he owned. As she learned to read, Flower taught her daughter, Rose, to read.

The only problem with books and reading is that they open the wide world, which can make a harem seem like a prison even though it was Ellen who had the bars. The women were not allowed to leave the harem. Everything they needed was brought to them by the servants. Here she was a Queen, and she didn’t have as much freedom as her servants, Flower thought. The servants were allowed to take her young daughter to the marketplace and Rose described it to her mother, but she was careful not to tell Ellen about it. At times Ellen still thought about escape. If Flower was caught helping Ellen escape, she could be executed, and she did not believe Adonai would save her. Some things are written.

Her own mother had taught Flower some herbal secrets. One was for a recipe that would prevent pregnancy. Another would put someone to sleep for hours. I guess the Sultan’s fears about his concubine were not so far off the mark. One morning Flower put her maids and Ellen and the eunuch to sleep by exchanging their morning tea with her own herbal tea with honey. She dressed herself in the maid’s clothing and had her daughter take her to the marketplace. Flower had no money to spend but she was fascinated by the colors, the sounds, the characters of the sellers and the buyers, and piles of goods for sale. It was exciting and she didn’t want to go back to the harem, but she did. She vowed that she would try to get some money to bring with her the next time.

One of the maids, when Flower asked her for money, told her that Flower should be able to trade her jewels for money to buy whatever she needed. That same maid agreed to go with her next time she went to market. So, they gave the sleeping tea to all the others and Flower carried with her in a plain purse the items of jewelry she hoped to sell. The maid knew a man who would not mind where the jewels came from; he would be happy to exchange them for money. The maid had heard that he was honest and gave good value. It was an easy exchange, two ruby earrings gone, a pile of coins in her plain bag. Then they shopped. The maid picked out the things they needed for meals and grooming. They didn’t buy the beautiful scarves because Flower had so many already. Rose wanted some candy, so they bought that. Then Flower saw the bookseller. She was in front of his stand in a heartbeat, looking over his meagre collection. Suddenly she opened a little book and found it full of pictures and she read a few words on the page and saw that some lines indicated rivers and oceans. She had to have that book, which the bookseller called a book of maps. It cost so little. She had plenty of coins to buy that book, another book, and many coins left over to go to the marketplace again.

But they stayed too long at the market, and everyone had woken up. The Sultan had been to the harem and left and he had raised an alarm. Where was Flower he demanded to know? He was so angry that he was frightening everyone in the place. As soon as she heard the raised voices, and as soon as the threatening sounds reached the harem, she presented herself to her husband and told him that she had wanted to visit the marketplace without anyone finding out who she was. She told him she impersonated a maid. He forbade her to ever go to the marketplace again, but once he calmed down, he turned his mind to other things. Ellen had finally agreed to become Second Wife and he was redecorating to make the palace fresh and new, or he had hired people to do that for him. He was sleeping in a tent with his sons in tents all around him until the rooms were ready. It was fun, like being off to war, but with no fighting or wounded men, and no death.

Ellen was also being refurbished. She was being plucked and bathed and rubbed with exotic oils and pampered with new garments. Her hair was washed and finger-dried by one of the maids until it shown like gold. But Ellen was still alone at times, and it was in those times that she and Flower went over the maps. Ellen still wanted to escape and now that Flower could read, she wanted them to escape together and Rose too. Flower was willing to get out into a bigger world and have more freedom. She had plenty more jewelry to pay their way and Ellen would soon own some jewelry of her own. Ellen told Flower that she needed a new name. She said she would call her Susan and she began to teach her how to speak French, of course not the French that is spoken today. Rose was a name that would be suitable in many places.

Flower knew that if Ellen started having the Sultan’s children, she would not want to leave them. She taught Ellen how to use herbs to keep her from becoming with child. She knew it would be years before they could leave if Ellen got involved in raising a family and if they had to wait for the Sultan to lose interest in her. At first, after her marriage, Ellen changed. She fell in love with the Sultan, when he was away from her, she yearned for him. But she did not want children, so she drank the herbal brew faithfully. Getting the herbs was a simple task, since only common herbs were needed and those could be purchased by Flower’s maid in the marketplace with the coins left from the ruby earrings. Ellen knew, vaguely, that the Sultan would eventually tire of her, and she also knew that as they were without children, he would have to set her aside and find a third wife. He would send her off to the harem and then miss her and come fetch her from the concubine quarters only to push her away again. When the Vizier brought the Sultan a beautiful and very young Nubian woman (she was fourteen) Adon continued to take Ellen to his bed for a while. He also ordered Flower and Ellen to prepare his new concubine for marriage.

Flower’s sons did come to see her, and they paid her every respect and she enjoyed watching them grow into strong and exuberant boys. She could see the ambition to be the next Sultan growing in the younger brothers who had no chance if the eldest brother continued to thrive. Were they plotting already to harm the eldest? Did all the brothers have an ambition to be Sultan? Soon Adon would have to send them out to fight in his armies and live apart from each other. He would have to assign them to different positions or to rule conquered cities. He needed more sons. He would miss the comradery and the pleasure of having a family around him. He watched Rose grow and he saw that she was lovely, and she was pleasant, but he did not treasure her as he did his sons. Sometimes Rose wanted to let him discover that she could read but it was forbidden, her father was traditional, and so she didn’t dare.

Soon Flower and Ellen saw that they would have a greater chance to escape if their husband had more wives and more children and so they made sure that the harem became a busy, buzzing nest of femininity. They spent hours pouring over the maps trying to decide the route their escape would take. Where would they go to live? Ellen said that in Gaul women with money had much more freedom that they did here in Persia. Flower longed to have freedom before she was too old to enjoy it. She instructed her maid to find the man who exchanged jewelry for money and gave her small pieces to sell. Her stash of coins grew. So did the maid’s. Flower did not begrudge her maid the few coins she stole.

It took almost a decade to build up the harem so that it would be large enough to get lost in. They were in their thirties and still lovely, but to the Sultan they were old; they were the past, not the future. Ellen and Flower had to pretend that they were enemies who only tolerated each other’s company infrequently. Rose’s father had her married off to a local sheik and so they lost her as a fellow traveler, but they made sure Rose had memorized their route and their destination. Then they set the date for when they would leave.

Did they succeed in their escape? What adventures did they have on their way? What disguises did they adopt to avoid detection? How much had things changed in the world outside of Persia? Since Persia was conquered by Alexander the Great in 350 BC these women had to be very clever to make their way in places where women did not travel alone. Indhir, always a friend to Flower, now Susan, made them memorize a list of men like him that he had known and where they lived so that if they needed the protection of having a male person with them, they had safe men to call on. All they had to do was mention Indhir’s name and offer his respects.

The ancient book that contains this tale ends when the women make their escape. Was it written by Flower and hidden in the harem? There were rumors in other texts about a small community of erudite women living in France when it was still Gaul. We don’t know how long such a community could survive in a world that was even more of a man’s world than the world we know today. Personally, I like to picture Ellen, Susan and Rose in a room full of books, teaching local young women to read and write, a skill they would have to hide and pass on secretly.