In 1824 Mehmed Bey, the colonel of one of the first six regiments of Mehmed Ali's new army, wrote to the Pasha telling him he had a problem with those who committed sodomy: should he treat them as adulterers (and thus apply the punishment for adultery on them) or should he apply a different law? Mehmed Ali responded by saying that the colonel had to consult the military regulations and apply what they said. The problem was that by that time the military regulations and laws that had been translated and published in the Būlāq Press made no mention of sodomy or how to deal with it.

QUESTION: The ambiguity of whether sodomy should trigger adultery punishment reveals how imported legal codes left gaps for unanticipated offenses.

Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed…, loc. 628