Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Origin
- Alexandria in the Time of Caesar
- Imperial Alexandria
- The Roman Library
- Political Climate
- Religion: Serapis and Sophia
- Augustan reform of the city's laws and government
- Civil Unrest and Evolution of Pharonic to Imperial Veneration
- Roman scholarship
- Civil Unrest in the First Century
- Slow and Uneven Decline and Ethnic Strife
- Revolt Against Rome and the Founding of the Caesareum
- The Rise of Christianity
- Martyrs Mixed Up in Ethnic Strife
- Alexandrian Christianity and Mysticism
- Christians Retaliate
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
"And concerning the number of books, the establishment of libraries, and the
collection in the Hall of the the Muses, why need I even speak, since they are
all in men's memories?"-- Athenaeus of Alexandria[1]
The Library of Alexandria, in reality two or more libraries in the ancient
Egyptian capitol, has achieved an almost mythic stature in the study of
classics from the time of the Renaissance. The apocryphal burning of the
Library during Julius Caesar's occupation of the city has been described as the
greatest calamity of the ancient world, wherein the most complete collection of
all Greek and Near Eastern literature was lost in one great conflagration. In
reality, the Library and its community of scholars not only flourished during
the Hellenistic era of the Ptolemies, but continued to survive through the
Roman Empire and the incessant turbulence of the Empire's most volatile and
valuable city. For valuable indeed was the granary of the empire, which was
also a prosperous trade center between east and west, linked to the
Mediterranean and, not far to the east, to the Red Sea and Indian traderoutes
via a canal. This cosmopolitan city drew Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, and Jews
into a unique and not entirely harmonious coexistence. The Alexandrian Museum
and Library, then, was an ideal place for scholars from these different
cultures to meet and exchange learning, and was a repository for the literature
and accounts of the Alexandrian intelligensia and the Roman Empire in general.
However, while sources agree on the Museum's uniqueness and value, no surviving
account of its activities actually exists, and modern scholarship has largely
ignored this poorly-documented portion of history.
In order to discuss the history of the Library and Museum in the Imperial
period, it is necessary to give a brief overview of their background. The
first mention of the Library itself is found in a Jewish document of 180-145
B.C., The Letter of Aristeas , a propagandistic account of the
translation of the Septuagint by the seventy-two rabbis into Greek. This
translation was commissioned by the Museum's founder, Demetrius, under the
patronage of Ptolemy I, Ptolemy Soter.[2] The establishment of the Library
was handed down to Ptolemy II, Ptolemy Philadelphus, in 283 B.C., and it was
perhaps during his reign that the monarch began the practice of attracting
scholars, housing and funding them in the Museum, and collecting the vast
Library.[3] The idea of a formal
institution for scholars of all kinds, complete with a library, was a new one,
and the Museum was modelled on the Lyceum of Aristotle in Athens; Demetrius
himself, an exiled tyrant of Athens, was one of Aristotle's followers.[4] Its immediate predecessors were
the shrines of the Muses, which by this time were not only cult centers, but
also foci for literary competitions, festivals, and literary societies.[5] The Museum, too, was a shrine
built for the glorification of the Muses, and from the outset contained lecture
halls, laboratories, observatories, living quarters, colonnades for ambulatory
discussions, a dining hall, a garden, a zoo, the shrine itself, and,
presumably, the library, which most archaeologists and scholars conclude was
housed within the shrine and not in a separate building.[6] A priest was appointed by the
Pharoah as the administrator of the Museum, and a separate Librarian was
responsible for the collection. The physical building's whereabouts are
unknown, although it is supposed to have been within the walls of the Royal
Palace, whose grounds were in the Brucheion, the Greek sector of the city.[7] Here 100 scholars lived, carried
out new scientific research, published, lectured, performed the first
systematic study of Greek literature (inventing the notions of accents and of
grammar, a mixed blessing to some), edited, critiqued, and collected all Greek
classics, and also gathered translations of Assyrian, Persian, Egyptian,
Jewish, Indian, and other nations' literature, having nearly a million works in
its holdings during the late Ptolemaic period.[8] a second "daughter" library, the
Serapeion, was soon established in the temple of Serapis, a popular god
invented by the Ptolemies as a synthesis of Zeus, Pluto, Osiris, and the Apis
bull. This library, found in the Rhakotis or Egyptian sector, was open to all,
not just to royally pensioned scholars, and had copies of many of the Museum's
scrolls.[9] By the time of Julius
Caesar's entry into Alexandria in 48 B.C. which heralded the end of the
Ptolemies, the Museum had already seen centuries of civil unrest and produced
much of the literature of the Hellenistic era.
Alexandria became the second stage for the civil wars of Caesar; here the
double drama of Antony and Cleopatra, then Caesar and Cleopatra played before
the skeptical populace. During the latter, Julius Caesar supported Cleopatra
against her brother Ptolemy XIV, and was besieged by the latter's army and
fleet in the Royal Precinct where was the Museum. It was at this moment, in 48
B.C., that the most well-known "burning of the Library" occurred, although many
subsequent disasters would later be hailed as the final destruction of the
Library. The legend apparently rose from Livy's account of the Alexandrine
war, now lost, but quoted by all subsequent scholars dealing with the topic,
including Seneca. Apparently, Livy stated that 400,000 rolls were destroyed
when, after Caesar set fire to the docks to block Ptolemy's fleet, the flames
consumed some nearby warehouses in which scrolls as well as grain were being
kept.[10] Scholars have debated
hotly over this conflagration since Roman times, disputing whether an actual
library was burned or whether these rolls had anything to do with the Museum.
Fraser is one of the most pursuasive advocates of the theory that the Library,
being in the Royal Precinct, was near enough to the docks to be ignited. He
suggests that the loss of 40,000 volumes also explains why the Museum's library
appears to gradually lost prestige to the younger Serapeion.[11] Others assert that the fire
was apocryphal, or confused with later fires. Still others suggest that these
books were in fact copies waiting to be shipped to private collectors or other
libraries. Since, as Fraser points out during his discussion, Didymus,
Tryphon, and Theon researched in the Museum not long afterwards, I lean towards
the common theory that, if any books were lost in this fire, copies of
important works must have survived and the library's collection not
significantly damaged by the incident. At any rate, Caesar was relieved by the
arrival of the Roman fleet, and crushed and killed Ptolemy XIV in the battle of
the delta, effectively conquering the kingdom.[12] Julius Caesar himself probably
spent time in the Library during this period, since the Julian calander which
he adopted, with twelve months, 365 days, and a leap year was identical to the
Alexandrian Aristarchus' calandar of 239 B.C.[13]
Now we turn to Alexandria at the beginning of the Imperial period, when for a
while, the infamous Alexandrian mob was relatively peaceful. Strabo, the
geographer who based his studies on his research at the Library and who lived
in Alexandria from 25-20 B.C., witnessed Caesar's "conquest" of Egypt and
subsequent changes made in the Ptolemaic state. Strabo's description of the
Library is the most detailed until that of a 4th century scholar, Johannus
Tzetzes, and by its brevity shows just how little actually was written about
the institution:
The Museum is part of the Royal Quarter and it has a cloister and an arcade and
a large house in which is provided the common meal of the men of learning who
share the Museum. And this community has common funds, and a priest in charge
of the Museum, who was appointed previously by the kings, but now by Caesar.[14]
The Library probably gradually developed similar practices to those of Roman
collections, or, perhaps, the other way around; at any rate, in addition to the
old divisions set up by Callimachus in the 250's B.C., with its ten halls each
devoted to a branch of literature, science, or philosophy, contemporary
libraries were now divided into Greek and Roman sections. Manuscripts, which
had increasingly been made on parchment rather than papyrus since the days when
Ptolemaic Alexandria had cut off its papyrus shipments to spite the library at
Pergamon, started to be kept in armaria, wooden chests, in addition to
the pigeonholes or shelves of earlier times and linen or leather jackets for
the more important scrolls. These armaria continued to be used
throughout the Middle Ages.[15]
The only other significant change brought to the library by Imperial rule was
that, since the Royal Precinct was no longer a restricted area, the Museum was
now available to the public.[16]
Such was the library; the rest of the city continued its business of trade and
bickering as usual. Even the toppling of the good god Pharoah could not
dissuade the Alexandrians from the latter; the infamous mob merely turned from
sniping at their rulers for conniving with Roman foreigners, and began
directing taunts at the Roman immigrants themselves. For while the Egyptians
had partially accepted the Ptolemies, who had created a prosperous city, had
shared a common enemy (the Persians), and, when they had conquered the latter,
even returned all the Egyptian treasures and sacred objects stolen by Persia to
Alexandria, the Romans had done little to endear themselves to the Alexandrian
populus.[17]
The old gods, meanwhile, had not died out, but merely been woven together with
the pantheons of newcomers. Strabo's contemporary, Vitruvius, describes a
festival of the Muses in Alexandria, almost certainly based at the Museum, so
it seems that the religious aspect of the institution continued to play an
important part in Imperial Alexandria.[18] By Roman times, the worship of
purely Olympian gods had altered as the population had become a Greek-Egyptian
mix, and all the gods were now worshipped as their Egyptian counterparts with
Greek attributes.[19] Bsides the
Egyptian Greeks, the Jews accounted for a significant amount of the population,
living in their own quarter, governed by an ethnarch, and originally exempted
from many of the taxes; their ethnarch was replaced by a Council of Elders
under Augustus.[20] An
intriguing dialogue between Pagan, Jewish, and, later, Christian thought
developed among the scholars of Alexandria,[21] as religious thought was
refined and ideas adapted not only from the other theologies common in
Alexandria, but from the Zoroasterism of Iran, and even, through the founder of
Neoplatonism, Ammonius Buddhism and Hinduism from India.[22] Thus, Jewish theologian Philo
could discuss a mother goddess figure, Sophia, spirit of wisdom, the messenger
from Jehovah, whose logos or existence would otherwise be
incomprehensible to humanity. Neoplatonism, itself invented at the Museum
during the Hellenistic era, portrayed the world as a flawed copy of its ideal,
and thus sought to avoid the material world and concentrate on the perfection
of the soul, which could be successively reincarnated, until it at last
achieved a Buddha-like Enlightenment. God itself was made up of a trinity,
and, again, conversed with man through Sophia. Some Neoplatonist thought would
later be incorporated into Christianity.[23] This religious dialogue was
never the main thrust of the Museum, but probably did involve it even more
directly with much of the social strife of the city.
This gives a general idea of Alexandria at the beginning of the common era.
Augustus, knowing the city's reputation for unrest, founded a new town,
Nikopolis, to the east in which he stationed a large garrison. He pronounced
an edict that no Roman patrician could visit Egypt without his permission,
ostensibly to protect the nobles from Egyptian corruption, but also to insure
that no one could covertly gain control of the Empire's grain supply and thus
bring Rome to its knees.[24] At
the same time he installed a prefect, abolished the city Council, stripped all
the Ptolemaic magistrates of powers (thus forming a class of wealthy nobles
living a life of leisure who had no duties any longer), granted Jews the right
to govern their own affairs, curbed the priests but not religious practices,
and filled the Roman treasury with provincial taxes.[25]
While Strabo saw the Roman occupation as a stabilizing influence which brought
peace, prosperity, and growth to Alexandria, this was not entirely true. The
mob rule cited by earlier historians, which had been a major problem for most
of the Ptolemies until very late, had been weakened but not eliminated. Fraser
points out that many philosophers from the Athenian Academies, refugees of
Mithradates, had immigrated into Alexandria during the last fifty years
(Diodorus for one), and, as clients of the last Ptolemies, had not participated
in anti-Ptolemy nor anti-foreigner sentiment, and so were set apart from the
animosity of the masses.[26]
Thus their accounts of the city tended to underplay civil unrest. Yet social
friction did exist, not only between Jews and Greeks, who had been at
loggerheads in the city for several generations, but also between old and new.
Nikopolis, for one, was growing, attracting both trade and worshippers from
older shrines. For another thing, the Greco-Egyptians, most recent
representatives of a 4000-year-old civilization, were used to the Ptolemaic
pomp of their ruler, and were neither satisfied with worshipping an Emperor
across the sea nor, on the other hand, with a prefect who put on no public
displays whatsoever.[27] Perhaps
this is why they so eagerly welcomed Germanicus, a new Alexander, who claimed
to be abashed at their worshipful reception.[28] Without a Pharoah, Egypt
lacked the living representative of her sovereignty, and was keenly resentful
of the Roman fleet, partially consisting of Ptolemy's old ships, filling the
harbor. The abolition of the Council was also a bone of contention, as well as
the new general taxes replacing the Ptolemaic tax, which had been levied in
proportion to the productivity of one's property.[29] While previously priests,
respected members of the community, had been tax collectors following ancient
Egyptian tradition, now hired third parties levied a foreign tax and pocketed
some of the profits.[30]
Augustus made some gestures aimed at appreasing the city, including redigging
the Red Sea Canal and the farmers' irrigation ditches, as well as erecting new
buildings (many only known through commemorative Alexandrian coins),
establishing the Imperial agora, and giving the Jews greater freedom. The
erection of the Caeserium, however, introduced the controversial idea of
worshipping the Emperor, and the empowerment of Jews was not exactly comforting
to the prejudiced natives.[31]
The Caesarium itself would eventually become yet another Alexandrian library,
and so brings us back to our main subject. An influx of new ideas, brought
about by the comingling of new cultures and the increased prosperity of the
cirty, lent renewed vigor to the Museum.
The first century A.D. saw many fine Alexandrian scholars. Strabo, as already
mentioned, was not only a geographer, but also a Stoic philosopher, and in
addition dabbled in science, becoming fascinated with the inexplicable flooding
of the Nile.[32] Didymus, the
son of a fishmonger, showed by his humble birth that natives now had a chance
to become accomplished scholars. He wrote some 3,500 commentaries on most of
the Greek classics, including Callimachus the poet who created the world's
first known card catalog for the Royal Library in 250 B.C. In addition,
Didymus published an authoritative text of Homer based on the Hellenistic
Aristarchus' version and his own extensive analysis, wrote a critical
commentary On Demosthenes, which included edited versions of
now-vansihed Phillipics, and created several Greek lexicons of tragedy,
comedy, and unusual Greek vocabulary.[33] His two younger
contemporaries, doing much of their work during Tiberius' reign, were the
grammarian Tryphon, and Theon. The latter was a literary commentator who not
only wrote literary analyses of authors such as Homer, Pindar, and Sophocles,
he was also the first at Alexandria to comment upon Hellenistic literature,
which was only now starting to be regarded as classical. He was also the first
to deal with contemporaries, and with the Pergamum school of scholars, for in
Ptolemaic times Pergamum had been the Museum's chief rival.[34] Some medical studies were also
pursued at the library, namely that of Heraclides of Tarentum and the surgeon
Celsus. Much later, Galen would become the foremost authority on medicine,
basing his researches on the literature of the Library as well as his own
experiences. Research in science had largely drifted to Pergamum and in
mathematics to Rhodes, but the Museum continued to pursue the forefront of
philosophy, with Neoplatonists and the Cynics who held popular appeal in the
masses.[35] Meanwhile, Museums
built on the Alexandrian model sprung up all over the empire.
By the time Caius (Caligula) succeded to the principate, the novelty of having
an Emperor was starting to wear thin, and Alexandria was once more embroiled in
civil unrest. There was extensive rioting between Greeks and Jews, an old
Alexandrian problem which had resurfaced. This was, perhaps, partly due to
Caligula's appointment of Herod Agrippa as King of Judea, who was a debtor to
many Alexandrian moneylenders, and who unfortunately stopped at the city en
route to Jerusalem. The Jews themselves were annoyed at his appointment, and
the Greeks were even less pleased. Furthermore, the Jews were refusing to
erect or worship statues of Caligula. Tensions and riots multiplied. The
Jewish historian Philo recorded these events and his own participation as an
envoy to Rome in 38 A.D. in his Delegation to Caius and On Flaccus
, the latter referring to Caius' anti-
semitic
friend and replacement for the previous Alexandrian prefect. In addition, an
anonymous first and second century Acts of the Pagan Martyrs , a text of
uncertain origin composed in the form of dialogues between anti-semitic envoys
and unsympathetic emperors, presents a fictionalized opposing view.[36] Unrest over the Jewish-Greek
struggle continued through the next several emperors, as well as general
anti-Roman disturbences and protests concerning the abolished Council. The
only mention of the Museum in this period is that Suetonius says that it was
substantially enlarged by the Emperor Claudius, as appropriate for that
misunderstood scholar of the Julio-Claudian family.[37]
The city, meanwhile, prospered in spite of unrest, and its influence became
ever more apparent, notablty when its Jewish prefect Tiberius Julius Alexander
was instrumental in helping Vespasian gain the principate in 69 A.D. Titus,
the emperor's heir, pleased the Alexandrians by participating in the sacrifice
of the Apis bull.[38] Later,
Domitian (81-96 A.D.) encouraged the cult of Serapis to be revived after an
imperial ban was lifted, and had temples of Isis and Serapis built in Rome.
The prosperity of Alexandria was fickle, however. Due to more efficient
storage techniques and a new harbor, Rome became less dependent on Alexandrian
grain and, in the time of Trajan, actually sent shipments to the city to
relieve a famine.[39] That
emperor also redredged the old canal, aiding Alexandria's faltering economy.[40]
When the Jews in the East revolted yet again under Trajan in 116, Alexandria
followed suit, beginning yet another ethnic and religious clash fueled by the
grievances of the refugees from Judea.[41] Roman troops helped Greeks in
Alexandria's guerilla war that continued throughout Trajan's reign, but there
is evidence that anti-semitism was sated with the many bloody massacres and
began to turn once more to anti-Romanism.[42] During this period, a
historian Dio Chrysostom delivered A speech to the Alexandrians, which
pointed out how disorganized and useless the rioting was, inducing the Romans
to tighten their grip; and how Alexandrians had merely exchanged their dislike
of the Ptolemies for a hatred of the Romans.[43]
Hadrian finally crushed the Alexandrian uprising through the efforts of Quintus
Marcus Turbo. During his visit to Alexandria in 130, the Emperor restored the
city, founded a new library in the Caesareum, discussed philosophy at the
Museum, and started a campaign to attract sophists such as Dionysius of Miletus
and Polemon of Laodikeia to the Museum. This brought a minor second century
revival of Alexandrian scholarship.[44] His visit was later mimicked
by Septimius Severus in 199-200, who rebuilt parts of the city and, at long
last, reestablished the Council abolished by Augustus.[45] More seriously, the mob made
the mistake of satirizing his successor, Caracalla, when he staged a visit to
participate in the worship of the Apis bull. Enraged, the emperor had the city
attacked and plundered, and its youth massacred. He cut off the imperial
revenue to the Museum and banished all foreigners from that institution, but it
seems to have survived the sacking.[46] After this, the city never
fully recovered its previous prosperity.
Several more wars did little to help Alexandria's stability, which was even
more disrupted as Christianity grew in strength and began to challenge both Jew
and Pagan. In 265 A.D., riots broke out in Alexandria merely over an argument
between a slave and a soldier over the value of a pair of shoes, and in the
subsequent chaos, Laelius Mussius Aemilianus, the city prefect, seized the
granaries and declared himself emperor. The emperor Galliensus sent Theodotus,
his best general, to besiege the rebel faction holed up in the Royal Precinct,
and eventually put down the insurrection. Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria,
described firsthand the havoc wrecked by the siege, but mentions neither
Library nor Museum, which certainly would have come under fire.[47] Another war in the 270's
between the desert oasis of Palmyra and Alexandria damaged both cities
severely, when Queen Zenobia conquered the Egyptian capitol and declared
herself emperor, eventually being defeated by the Roman emperor Aurelian. This
war further seems to have damaged the Libraries' collection.[48] Finally, Diocletian had to
quell yet another revolt under the pretender Domitian, eventually destroying
much of the Brucheion quarter. The Christian-Pagan religious clashes in
Alexandria had by this time become as violent as the Jewish-Greek, and
Diocletian issued an edict upon his abdication in 305 to destroy Christianity.
He also ordered all the Museum's books on metallurgy to be burned, implying
that at least part of the collection survived.[49] Egyptian Christianity
memorializes this half-century of persecution by beginning its calandar with
254 A.D., the start of their "Era of the Martyrs".[50]
Christian thought was both refined and bizarrely altered during this turbulent
era in Alexandria. Introduced by the Alexandrian St. Mark according to
tradition, it was initially mistaken by the Emperor Hadrian as a troublesome
offshoot of the cult of Serapis.[51] Indeed, the Eucharist,
resurrection, and reverence to the Mother were developed in Alexandria during
this period, and seem to have echoes in the cult of Serapis, with its
Dionsian-style feasting and resurrection, and his consort Isis/Cybele/Demeter.
And while the religion had previously been a popular movement of the masses, it
was at Alexandria that learned intellectual debate discussed the more
philosophical parts of the religion and paved the way for Medieval theological
debates.[52] Branches of thought
such as Arianism and Gnosticism were to be developed here, and, although later
declared heretical, grew side by side with what later became Christian
orthodoxy. Gnosticism continues to this day in Egypt; it held that the world
was actually a mistake created by the Demiurge, son of the true God and Sophia,
who was the Jehovah of the old Testament; God pitied humanity and sent Christ
to help humanity reunite with Himself. Some held that Jesus had been a man,
and the Christ His spirit after death. The Ophites, an offshoot of the
Gnostics with Cretan influences, carried the religion a step further,
worshipping snakes and the divine mother Sophia, who had actually sent the
serpent of Eden to warn Eve and Adam that Jehovah was the Demiurge and that
they should seek wisdom or knowledge to link with the true God.[53] And, lest these heresies seem
too wild, it should be remembered that the first patron saint of Alexandria for
the orthodox Christians of the 4th century was St. Anthony, "who thought
bathing was sinful and was consequently carried across the canals of the delta
by an angel".[54] The general
tone of most Christian writings is encapsulated by E.M. Forster: "A feeling of
joy inspired their interminable writings."[55]
It may well be imagined how Alexandria continued to be shaken by social strife
during such a period. After a mere twenty years since the abdication of
Diocletian, Canstantine became Emperor and declared Christianity Rome's
official religion. By 391, the Emperor Theodosius had reversed Diocletian's
edict and commanded all paganism to be stamped out, signalling the end of the
Museum.[56] For, throughout the
fourth century the power of the church grew; an army of Gnostic monks became
the main tool of the Patriarch of Alexandria and enforced his will. After the
edict of Theodosius, the mob was led by the Patriarch Theophilus to demolish
the Serapeum.[57] Perhaps the
library at the Caesarium survived; while references to Alexandrian scholars
persist a little while longer, no sources actually mention its destruction. In
412 Theophilus' nephew Cyril succeeded him. The Patriarch exercised ever more
control of the city, and the conflict between secular and religious authority
was decided in 415, when the Roman prefect Orestes, officially still in charge
of the province, objected to Cyril's order that all Jews be expelled from the
city. Cyril's army of monks murdered the prefect and were cannonized by him
for this deed; marauding through the city they came across Hypatia, daughter of
the Museum's last great mathematician Theon. She was a Neoplatonist philosopher
and astronomer whose teachings are partially recorded by one of her admirers
and pupils, the Christian Synesius, and she was also supposedly an advisor to
Orestes and one of the last members of the Museum. Driving home from her own
lectures without attendant, this independent woman and scholar epitomized the
suspect nature of Paganism and its heretical scientific teachings. She was
dragged from her chariot by the mob, stripped, flayed, and finally burned alive
in the library of the Caesareum as a witch. Cyril was made a saint.[58] After her death Alexandria
became steadily less stable, overrun by the monks who evolved into the Copts,
who incorporated the old Alexandrian prejudices towards foreigners with the new
prejudice towards any scientific or classical knowledge. Too turbulent even to
bow to the Emperor, Alexandria eventually revolted against Constantinople,
wound up with two factions contending between two Patriarchs, and eventually
fell to Arab conquerers, who had the last of the Library burned as fuel in the
bath-houses of the city in 686.[59]
Thus the Library of Alexandria and the Museum wended its way through the
turbulent history of the Empire and outlived it by a short space of time,
although paucity of sources makes it difficult to reconstruct an exact
chronology of events. Its research probably reflected the foment of the times,
and, while Neoplatonist in the main, also attracted other religious scholars,
especially Jews, from Hellenistic times onward. Repeatedly rebuilt, modified,
and burned, the few facts that can be determined about its long history justify
its semi-legendary status. Haven for scholars of all kinds, its purpose as a
center for learning was its eventual downfall. Enduring through Hellenistic
civil strife, Dynastic war, the transition from kingdom to Roman province, and
the abuses and good fortune it received through the sometimes capricious
actions of successive emperors, it could not withstand the violent beginnings
of Christianity which the city of Alexandria itself largely shaped.
Canfora, Luciano. The Vanished Library. trans. Martin Ryle. University
of California Press. Berkely: 1989.
Forster, E.M. Alexandria: a History and a Guide. Doubleday & Co.,
Inc. Garden City: 1961.
Fraser, P. M. Ptolemaic Alexandria. Volume I of III. Oxford
University Press. Oxford: 1972.
Johnson, Emer D. History of Libraries in the Western World. Scarecrow
Press, Inc. Metuchen: 1970.
Kamil, Jill. Upper Egypt: Historical Outline and Descriptive Guide to the
Ancient Sites. Longman. New York: 1983.
Milne, J. Grafton. a History of Egypt Under Roman Rule. Methuen &
Co., Ltd. London: 1924.
Parsons, Edward Alexander. The Alexandrian Library: Glory of the Hellenic
Hellenic
World. Elsevier Press. New York: 1952.
Westermann, William Linn. The Library of Ancient Alexandria. lecture
given at University of Alexandria's reception hall. University of Alexandria
Press. Alexandria: 1954.
Ellen N. Brundige
ellen@medusa.perseus.tufts.edu