Dar al Salaam
The 1880 British Invasion
of the Land of Peace

Turn 4-16-00 Players' View

by Chris Engle

The two-month archaeological expedition to Dar as Salaam in 1880 had several notable outcomes. First, Schliemann's discovery of the "Valley of the Kings" was the founding event of modern Egyptology. Ever larger expeditions were mounted through the 1920's; though Schliemann himself gave up the hunt. The artifacts he brought home were mostly sold to collectors to defray expedition costs, but the choicest artifacts (among them the famed bust of Nefertiti) became the nucleus of the Berlin Museum's significant Egyptology collection.

Second, his successful negotiations with Ali Baba for the hostages made Schliemann a hero among the British, Americans, and of course the Germans. He was rewarded with a decoration and a title from the Kaiser, and became a board member of the German-African Colonization Society and an advisor on African and Middle Eastern investments and cultural affairs. He spent the remainder of his life touring and lecturing, dying in 1890.

Wilhelm Dorpfeld, assistant director of the expedition, spent the rest of his life happily excavating the lost cities of Mycenean Greece.

The efficient, no-nonsense Herr Schmidt became a cultural attache in German East Africa.

Auguste Mariette of the Service of Antiquities, upon learning of Schliemann's coup, died of an apoplectic fit. Gaston Maspero took over and ran the Service until his death in 1920.

William Flinders-Petrie and Amelia Edwards together founded the British Egyptology Society in 1882. Filnders-Petrie led numerous digs in Egypt, and was eventually knighted. Edwards continued to write and travel.

Henry Jones returned to New York to a hero's welcome. He returned to his archaeology studies and received his doctorate from Columbia in 1885. He worked in American and Mexican Indian archaeology, as did his son Henry jr. ("Indiana" Jones)

Captain George Dewey went on to command the American Pacific Fleet during the Spanish-American War, and was responsible for defeating the Spanish at the battle of Manila Bay.

Captain von Trapp completed his tour of duty in 1882, and continued to serve his emperor with the Austrian Navy, ending as commander of the defenses of Trieste during the First World War.

Mustapha became sheik of the Banu al-Malik after his father Mamud's death; for two more years he defended his tribe's honor from bandits, until he was murdered by a cousin over a problem with his inheritance.

"Serving virtually as the de facto ruler of Dar As Salaam, M DuPrey continues to prosecute the war against Ali Baba and run the nations economy. He also oversees the gradual dominance of French influence in the country, reorganising it's army, civil service and legal and education systems on French lines. For most Salaamites French becomes their second language. He moves back to Paris in 1885 to be appointed to a senior position in the French Foreign ministry, considerably wealthier due to his (secret!) stakes in Dar As Salaam's gold mining industry and newly constructed railway. DuPrey retires from government service in 1892 and spends the remainder of his days on the boards of several major French banks and commercial organisations. He returns briefly to government service as an adviser to Clemenceau on colonial matters at the Versailles Peace Conference of 1919. DuPrey dies, bloated and obscenely wealthy, at a Swiss health spa in 1923 and is mourned by the press as France's answer to Cecil Rhodes...

Place DuPrey, Dar As Salaam City's main square, is renamed 'Revolution Square' following the leftist military coup in 1968."

Dar as Salaam: 1880 British Invasion Matrix Game

Started in MG #11.

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