Gertrude Bell’s remarkable life as an explorer, archaeologist and influential figure who helped shape the modern Middle East after WWI
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By 1914, Gertrude Bell had spent around 15 years travelling in the Middle East and Europe. Following the outbreak of the First World War, she was called upon by the British government to assist in its war efforts. Based first in Cairo and then in Baghdad, she used her extensive knowledge to help shape Britain’s wartime policy in the Middle East. An archaeologist, explorer, writer and Fellow of the Society, Bell is also the only woman to have had her name inscribed in gold on the Society’s Ondaatje lecture theatre halls when it was built nearly 100 years ago, in 1930.
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Now, a new exhibition, Routes, Ruins and Reconnaissance, opening this August, will consider Bell’s relationship with the Society, highlighting their contributions to the war effort and showcasing unique photographic and documentary material in one venue for the first time.
The exhibition marks the completion of a 17-month collaborative project between Newcastle University and the Society, generously supported by the Harry and Alice Stillman Foundation. It will feature some of the 530 newly digitised images created from original negatives held in the Society’s Collections, as well as treasures from the Gertrude Bell Archive, held in Newcastle. To mark the moment, we’re sharing a timeline of Bell’s iconic life and work.
Gertrude Bell, 1868–1926
1868: Bell is born in Washington, North East England.
1886–88: Bell studies Modern History at Oxford.
Jordan, 1913–14. Image: RGS-IBG
1889–1914: As a result of family wealth and connections, Bell is able to travel widely to Europe and the Middle East. This included journeys to Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, and Mesopotamia (a historical region of West Asia that roughly corresponds to modern-day Iraq). Travelling through the Ottoman Empire, Bell developed an interest in photography and in medieval, early Islamic, and Byzantine architecture.
1913: RGS membership is opened permanently to women, with 163 joining in that first year alone, including Bell. At the RGS, Bell receives the Gill Memorial Prize and undertakes training in using a theodolite and in observing maps and photographs.
November 1913: After receiving the prize, Bell travels to Hail, Saudi Arabia, to record archaeological sites. Bell keeps diaries and detailed architectural studies of everything she sees – notebooks that are stored in the RGS. In her diaries, Bell contemplates what purpose keeping these records served: ‘I am not sure what profit I shall get out of it all.’
1914: Bell works for the Red Cross.
1915: Bell is invited to Cairo to help David Hogarth with intelligence files.
1916: Now considered a specialist on the Middle East, Bell is called upon to assist the British government in Mesopotamia during the First World War. She moves to Baghdad to work for Sir Percy Cox in the British administration. She is based there for the rest of her life.
1918: Bell is awarded the Society’s Royal Gold Medal. After the war ends, Bell has a huge influence on post-WWI Mesopotamia, shaping the country’s spatial and architectural legacies.
1926: Bell dies in Baghdad, aged 57
Routes, ruins and reconnaissance is open until 24 August: bit.ly/4elOrIB
Bell’s story is just one of many. As Dr Sarah Evans, Research and Higher Education Manager at the Society noted: ‘I’m really delighted about this collaboration and what it’s going to unlock … encountering Bell as a complex and fascinating figure worthy of further study. But I keep coming back to those other 162 women who were elected to the Society in 1913 and what stories we might uncover about them and their work and lives. But that will have to wait for another day.’
