Alexandria ad Aegyptum

Abstract

From the time of Alexander the Great, Alexandria ad Aegyptum 1, the Hellenic capital of Egypt designed by Deinokrates, was a centre of learning. It was situated at the westernmost tributary of the Nile, along its widest channels, and seemed destined after Alexander’s destruction of Tyre to become the dominant centre of trade between the Mediterranean, the Nile Valley, Arabia and India. Ideally located at the crossroads of these cultures, it attracted people from everywhere and could rightly be called the world’s first cosmopolitan metropolis. The city was oblong-shaped: about 4 miles at its longest and about a mile wide2. The streets were laid out in a checkerboard pattern, with two large thoroughfares that almost bisected the city. Off the mainland, in the harbour of Alexandria, lay the isle of Pharos with its famous lighthouse. The island was almost connected to the shore by a long finger of land, a promontory known as Lochias, which stretched out towards the east. A causeway called the Heptastadium was built from the mainland, thus closing the bay toward the west.