Beirut 1830: Emir Bashir Shihab and the Cotton Boom

Episode 100 of The Story of Lebanon steps back to the 1830s, a decade when Mount Lebanon was swept into a global cotton frenzy. In the aftermath of Egyptian occupation under Ibrahim Pasha, Emir Bashir Shihab II — the wily Druze turned Maronite ruler — played a dangerous game of alliance, playing the Egyptians against the Ottomans while exploiting a cash crop that transformed the mountain's economy. But the boom also deepened tensions between Maronite peasants and Druze landlords, laying the groundwork for the 1840s upheavals. This episode traces the cotton trade's rise and fall, the Emir's shifting loyalties, and the fate of Deir al-Qamar as a silk-and-cotton hub. We meet the Shihab dynasty, the Jumblatt family, and the British consul who tried to broker peace — all against a backdrop of imperial competition between Mehmed Ali's Egypt and the Sublime Porte.

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