The Interviewees
Interview with Dominique Gogny - February 2022 - français
1- How did these archives end up in your possession?
Jean-Yves Empereur, creator (1990) and director of the CEAlex had created links with Alexandrian families descended from pioneers who arrived during the 19th century. He invited them to informal evenings on the terrace of the building.
This is why Josiane and Christine Ayoub respectively wife and granddaughter of descendants of the Zogheb and Sinano families chose to give the thousands of documents they had inherited to Jean Yves Empereur for possible research work on this particular society, which is was created, lived and dissolved between the middle of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th century.
Personally, when the dozens of boxes arrived at the CEAlex premises, I was there, looking for a subject of study.
I took the opportunity…
2- What do these archives tell us about the life of Alexandrian notables between the end of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th century?
They tell us a lot of things.
The oldest document dates from 1866.
These are documents that relate to private or daily life and to the public sphere. The fund contains nearly 7,000 documents. They come from two families but tell us about many others.
The Zogheb fund contains the diaries of Bernard de Zogheb from 1954 to 1998, the year before his death. He writes every day, one page a day, the story of his days, his meetings, his travels.
The sixty small diaries from 1924-1984 of his mother Mary de Zogheb (1897-1985) were very well organized, they are very useful for the knowledge of the Alexandrian life; they also bear witness to the opinions of the scriptress regarding the political events of her time.
Photo albums from 1900 to 1998.
The Ayoub Sinano fund is a wealth of information on all things life. They are professional, domestic, cultural, religious, worldly, family documents.
Sometimes these are doodles, cooking recipes, little words, all the postcards, business cards, empty but stamped envelopes, invoices, shopping lists, lists of names, seating plans for a reception, pictures pious, menus, telegrams, files, correspondence, etc.
But also, since part of the documents emanates from Charles Ayoub, we find the major files which he dealt with in the mixed courts, in the litigation of the State, in his law firm or in his activities of the law society of which he was one of the founders with Jaspers Brinton. We follow the development of Egyptian and Alexandrian institutions. We are interested in the corniche of Alexandria, the railways, the tramways, the question of income tax, maritime laws, the questions raised by the abolition of the mixed tribunals and its consequences on the rights to the retirement of its civil servants or lawyers.
3- What remains today of this cosmopolitan Alexandria?
We can perhaps count on the fingers of one hand, the last representatives of this society, Lucette de Saab having died last year, she who was truly representative with Bernard de Zogheb (1924-1999) of this rich Alexandrian society.
In the city, one still finds, in particular in the Greek Quarter, some beautiful villas formerly occupied by our notables. Some are likely to remain standing, because they have become museums, schools, cultural centers or consulates. Others are abandoned and no doubt condemned to planned destruction. The Sinano house, abandoned for many years, ended up being demolished and replaced by an imposing group of compact buildings.
The Ambron house could not resist the bulldozers of profit.
Interview conducted by Coline Houssais