The stories that we read from Arabian Nights portray a large variety of how women are seen and treated in early Islamic society. Throughout the stories, many women are slaves who are owned by men and must obey them in order to live. Shahrazad, for starters, is the one who ultimately spares the lives of the women in her village. “Scheherazade possessed courage, wit, and penetration. She had read much, and had so admirable a memory, that she never forgot any thing she had read.
She had successfully applied herself to philosophy, medicine, history, and the liberal arts; and her poetry excelled the compositions of the best writers of her time. Besides this, she was a perfect beauty, and all her accomplishments were crowned by solid virtue. ” (Haddawy, 24) She risks her life in hopes of healing the King of his malicious ways and she succeeds. Women of this time were indeed as heroic, if not more heroic than men. Even then, women were overtly oppressed on many levels.
The women of this early Islamic time are shown from various perspectives throughout the stories we have read, but their strength always seems to prevail. Power of women represents an important theme in Ali Baba and The Forty Thieves and The Three Apples because women were valiant, forced to earn respect, and seen as inferior, but also desired. Ali Baba and The Forty Thieves starts off with two persian brothers: Ali Baba and Cassim. Ali Baba works very hard to support his family, while Cassim is married to a wealthy woman.
One day, Ali Baba sees a bunch of men put a stash of loot in a nearby cave. Once the men are gone, Ali Baba uses the magic words he heard the men say “Open Sesame! ” and takes everything he and his mules can bear. There is enough gold to last for a lifetime of wealth for him and his family. Cassim and his wife forced the secret out of Ali Baba. Cassim goes to the cavern himself, but forgets the magic words and is trapped inside. So when the men come, they murder him, cut his body into quarters, and hang the body parts up around the cave as an example for anyone else who dares to enter.
Ali Baba discovers the corpse and brings it back to Cassim’s wife. Ali Baba vows to marry Cassim’s wife himself and orders Cassim’s maid, Morgiana, to bury the body without making a fuss about his tragic death. Mongiana hires and blindfolds a cobbler named Baba Mustapha to sew the body parts back together, so he can sew Cassim’s body back together without recognizing the house or family. The thieves go back to the cave and realize that the body is missing and are determined to get to the bottom of it because it means that someone else knows about the cave.
One of the thieves find Baba Mustapha and make him retrace his steps and when they find the location, the thief puts a white chalk mark on the house so he can show the rest of the thieves. Mongiana sees the white mark and senses that something is going on, so she puts white chalk marks on all the houses in the neighborhood. The chief of the thieves realizes that their plan is ruined and has another their find the cobbler again and they find the house again, this time marking it with red chalk. Mongiana, again, ruins the plan by marking the neighboring houses with red chalk.
The Chief of the thieves is angry and wants to figure out the mystery himself. He memorizes his steps to the house himself. He then dresses as an oil merchant. The other thieves are hidden in oil jars carried by mules; only one jar actually has oil in it. They plan to sneak out at night and murder Ali Baba in his sleep. Morgiana always seems to be one step ahead of the thieves. She uncovers the men in the jars, and boils oil from the final jar, killing them with it. The Captain escapes before he can be killed by the amazing Morgiana. Morgiana tells Ali Baba what happened and they bury the corpses.
Ali Baba then grants Morgiana her freedom for saving his life. However, the captain wanted vengeance. He dresses up as a merchant and becomes friends with Ali Baba’s son so that he is invited over for dinner. As always, Morgiana is one step ahead. She and another servant perform a dance at the dinner and she successfully stabs and kills the Captain. Ali Baba is eternally grateful. Morgiana exemplifies the power of women through out this story. In the society at the same, Morgiana was the lowest of the low because she was not only a woman, but also a slave.
However, Morgiana rises above and is the hero. Throughout stories of this time period, women usually create messes with their foolishness. Morgiana is definitely not one of those women. She consistently outsmarts the thieves and saves the day. This uncovers a clue of how women were treated during this time because it is clear that even the effectively invisible women rose up and challenged the norm; the norm being that women were owned by men and had no rights or intelligence. Morgiana is a prime example of heroic women of this time and the underlying power they had in society.
In the same story Ali Baba and The Forty Thieves, the power of women echoes through gaining respect. Morgiana rose above and beyond the men in this story as a woman and a slave. She had no respect to be begin with and was ordered by Ali Baba to bury Cassim’s chopped up corpse. Little did he know, that she would end up saving his life. This gives some insight as to what life was like for women during this time. Women were seen as barely human until they proved otherwise. Mogiana embodies the idea that women were not granted respect men were, it was earned.
The story of The Three Apples is about a fisherman who find a large, heavy chest and sells it to Caliph Harun al-Rashid. When the chest is opened, it reveals a woman’s corpse chopped up. Caliph orders that Ja’far investigates the murder. Two men come forward and confess to the murder. This story echoes the harsh ideology towards women in the stories of this time period. Initially, the story seems to revolve around justice for the poor woman who was killed. However, once the crime is confessed. no one seems to care about the woman anymore and all seems to be forgiven.
The mere fact that the murdered woman’s father was willing to take the blame for the sake of his son-in-law suggests the importance placed in the patriarchy at this time and how far men would go in order to protect masculinity. This is extremely unsettling, considering how brutally the girl was killed. It is prominent that women were expected to conform to a rather severe set of expectations. Including with Scheherazade herself, in the Frame Story. This tale The Three Apples also leads readers to believe that during early Islamic society women were seen as inferior, but were also desired greatly.
When the man confessed to killing his wife, he said, “So I conjure thee, by the honor of thine ancestors, make haste to kill me and do her justice upon me, as there is no living for me after her! ” (Haddawy, 155) The man said this because he felt he deserved only death for killing his wife. He viciously murdered her, yet believes he does not deserve to live because he did so. Which is very contradicting because he killed her because he believed she did not deserve to live after committing adultery. Due to blatant sexism by superior male figures throughout the stories of The Arabian Nights, the power of women was a very significant theme.
In the classic tales of Ali Baba and The Forty Thieves and The Three Apples women are seen as nothing, but they prove their worth. The Power of women in these tales send a strong message about how women were seen and treated in early Islamic society. Women must earn respect and prove their worth, unlike the men of this time. Women are shown in many different lights and aspects, but overall it is clear that no matter what the women of this time faced, they always had their own band of strength and dignity.
