Salme, the daughter of the Sultan of Oman and Zanzibar and a Circassian slave, secretly left the island of Zanzibar in 1866 to marry the Hamburg merchant Heinrich Ruete, whom she followed to his homeland. When her memoirs were published in 1886, the book attracted significant attention and was quickly translated into several languages. Salme recounts the exotic and turbulent daily life in the Sultan's palace and harem, describing the intrigues within the palace, highlighting the consequences these events had for the Sultanate in the context of Bismarck's and England's aggressive colonial policies. No contemporary colonial archive or documentation could illuminate the conditions and events that Emily Ruete, born Salme, Princess of Oman and Zanzibar, makes accessible to the reader here. Disowned by her family during her lifetime, Emily Ruete is now honored at the Palace Museum in Zanzibar.