Other members of the family remained in Smyrne until the beginning of 20th century and then migrated to the USA (San Francisco) and to France.
[The Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World states that Moreno was born in 1820, emigrated to Egypt in 1840, purchased "Au Petit Bazar" in 1882 and founded "Les Grands Magasins Cicurel" in 1910.
[1] The Cairo store "encompassed two buildings, each taking up a city block and looming four stories high ... Once inside, shoppers could view an array of goods in departments that supplied the king of Egypt as well as other elite and more middle class families.
[3]After the death of Moreno in 1919, his sons – Salomon, Joseph and Salvator – continued to run the family business empire and each gained prominence in his own right.
By 1927, Salomon, 46, had amassed significant personal wealth and lived in a sprawling villa on the Nile in the exclusive section of Giza (now part of Cairo University) until his brutal murder.
Shortly after midnight March 4, he was fatally stabbed eight times while his wife, Elvire Toriel, was reportedly chloroformed in the bed beside him.
Because of the high standing of the Cicurels in Egyptian society, the case was given top priority and personally headed by the Director General of Public Security Mahmoud Fahmi Keissy Pasha, who would later become Egypt's Minister of Interior.
[4] Due to the Cicurels' position and the fact that jewelry was stolen, hysteria broke out among Cairo's wealthy, who feared a wave of robbery-murders.
[6] This legal absurdity and its direct linkage to the question of sovereignty quickly became the subject of a heated political debate in both the Egyptian press and the country's new parliament.
[7] Salomon's funeral procession clogged traffic in Cairo streets as it inched toward the ancient palm-lined Jewish Bassatine cemetery.
"[9] In 1920 Joseph joined forces with Talaat Harb and prominent Jewish businessman Yusuf 'Aslan Qattawi to create Egypt's first national bank, Banque Misr.
[10] He settled his family in Paris, where he represented Banque Misr and continued to handle European suppliers for the Cicurel stores.
As captain, he led the Egyptian fencing team to win a silver medal at the 1928 Summer Olympic Games in Amsterdam.
[12] In addition to his many affiliations in sports and Egyptian commerce, Salvator was a founding member of the Friends of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and served on the Cairo Sephardic Jewish Community Council for more than 20 years.
During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the store was spared from being placed under government administration, as it was a preferred shopping destination of the royal family.
Nevertheless, while its businesses benefited from the family's connections in high society, the store could not escape the rising tensions surfacing in the political landscape.
[15] Neglecting the signs of changing times, the Cicurels remained in Egypt as tension against the Jews continued to mount.
"[18] By the end of 1956, when Les Grands Magasins Cicurel was placed under government control, the majority of the family had left Egypt.
The rest of the family born in Egypt dispersed across Europe and South America: Clément (1918-1978), moved to Italy, where he worked with the department stores La Rinascente and Marks & Spencer.
René (1916-2005) also settled in France and his son Paul Joseph (1945- ) moved to Canada and then the United States, where he built a successful career in finance.