Dubara Palace - History

History

The Dubara Palace played a major role in modern Egyptian history. It witnessed many conflicts and negotiations between 19th and 20th century royal Egyptian leaders and politicians, Egyptian nationalists, and British "imperialist occupation" administrators.

Modeled after Central European hotels particulier in the same genre, Villa Casdagli, now a decaying relic of the past, was built during the first decade of the 20th century by Austrian architect Edward Matasek (1867-1912) reportedly for account of Emanuel Casdagli, a British educated Levantine family of Georgian-Central Caucasia origins as the name would suggest, dealing in the lucrative Manchester trade.

Although Kasr al-Dubara is today mainly an hotel, office and banking district, it was once Cairo's top drawer residential quarter and home to several members of the Egyptian royal family who built their palaces there, hence the names Kasr al-Nil, Kasr al-Aali, Kasr al-Dubara, etc. (Kasr meaning palace).

No 1 Midan Kasr el Doubara in the early 1900's, probably about 1911. This villa had been the British Agency and was occupied by Lord Cromer and then Sir Eldon Gorst.

During the first half of this century, Kasr al-Dubara was also the embassy district. When the Casdaglis (Emanuel, later his sons: Alexis and Theodore) were not 'at home' they leased their villa to senior diplomats or diplomatic agencies. In fact, one of Villa Casdagli's pre WW-II tenants was the American Embassy.

It was not uncommon in those days for America to lease premises rather than outright buy them. But in March 1947 things changed, when, acting on instructions of the American State Department, US Ambassador Somerville Pinkney Tuck purchased part of the present day embassy compound. This was to become the first ever Egyptian real estate property owned by the American government.

Situated at No. 5 Kasr al-Walda Pasha Street (later Amrika al-Latinia St.), Pinkey Tuck's new quarters were a stone's throw from Villa Casdagli. Like the latter villa, it too belonged to a wealthy merchant-businessman, this time a Syrian called Alexander Chedid Bey.

Over the years and as American interests in Egypt expanded, the State Department purchased the contiguous properties including Villa Rolo which had also been built by Matasek. Turned into the American Library it was partly burnt down during the 1958 riots. Villas Chedid and Rolo were eventually pulled down, along with the apartment building which had replaced Villa Ades, to accommodate the impregnable American fortress which now occupies the entire hexagon.

Behind Villa Casdagli stood, until recently, Villa (Polychroni) Cozzica which belonged to a wealthy Greek family by the same name. For a long time the Cozzicas held the monopoly of distilled alcohol in Egypt.

During the years leading up to WW2 and much to the chagrin of the wary British diplomats holed up in their large quarters two blocks away, the Cozzicas leased their Cairo residence to the German legation. The last high ranking German visitor to call on Villa Cozzica was Reichsminister of Propaganda Dr. Joseph Goebbels in whose honor a dinner was held at the German Legation on the night of 6 April 1939.