Khartoum (film) Underdown) is lured into the desert and slaughtered by Muslim zealots led by Muhammad Ahmad (Laurence Olivier), a fanatic Sudanese Arab who believes he is the Mahdi, the prophesied "saviour of humanity". The British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone (Ralph Richardson), who does not wish to send more military forces to Khartoum, is under great pressure to send military hero Major General Charles George Gordon (Charlton Heston) there to salvage the situation and restore British prestige. Gordon has strong ties to Sudan, having broken the slave trade there in the past, but Gladstone distrusts him. Gordon has a reputation for
Khartoum recently as the 13th-17th centuries A.D. Captain J.A. Grant, who reached Khartoum in 1863 with Captain Speke's expedition, thought the name was most probably from the Arabic "qurtum" ( ', i.e., "Carthamus tinctorius"), which was cultivated extensively in Egypt for its oil to be used as fuel. Some scholars speculate that the word derives from the Nubian word, "Agartum" ("the abode of Atum"), the Nubian and Egyptian god of creation. Other Beja scholars suggest "Khartoum" is derived from the Beja word, "Hartoom" ("meeting"). Additionally, the dream-interpreting magicians in Genesis 41:8 are referred to as חַרְטֻמֵּ֥י מצרים("Khartoumei Mitzrayim" - Magicians of