Of the several capitals of Egypt in successive ages[11], Thebes, or
Diospolis, was the most ancient. Next was Memphis; itself a city of the
most remote antiquity. Babylon seems to have been only the capital of a
part, retained by the Persians, after Cambyses had subdued Egypt; and
was, by all accounts, founded by the Persians. Alexandria succeeded
Memphis, and remained the chief city, till the Saracens founded
Misr-el-Kahira.
Alexander, in his way to the temple of Jupiter Ammon, observed, opposite
to the island of Pharos, a spot which he thought extremely well adapted
for the building of a city. He, therefore, set about drawing the plan of
one; in doing which he particularly marked out the several places where
temples and squares should be erected. The general execution he
committed to the architect who had rebuilt the temple of Diana at
Ephesus (Dinocrates). This city he called Alexandria, after his own
name; and being situated with the Mediterranean on one side, and one of
the branches of the Nile on the other, it soon drew all the commerce,
both of the east and west. It still remains, and is situate about four
days' journey from Cairo. The merchandises were unloaded at Portus
Muris[12], a town on the western coast of the Red Sea; whence they were
brought upon camels to a town of Thebais, called Copt, and conveyed down
the Nile to Alexandria, whither merchants from all parts resorted.
The trade of the East has at all times enriched those who carried it on.
Solomon received from one commercial voyage, no less a sum than three
millions two hundred and forty thousand pounds[13]. Tyre afterwards had
the trade. When the Ptolemies, however, had built Berenice, and other
ports on the western side of the Red Sea, and fixed their chief mart at
Alexandria, that city became the most flourishing of all the cities in
the world. "There," says Prideaux, "it continued for many centuries
after; and all the traffic which the western parts of the world from
that time had with Persia, India, Arabia, and the eastern coasts of
Arabia, was wholly carried on through the Red Sea, and the mouth of the
Nile, till a way was discovered of sailing to those parts by the Cape of
Good Hope."
Alexander was buried[14] in the city he had built; and as the
sarcophagus in which he was placed has now become an object of great
curiosity, by having been taken from the French, at Alexandria, where it
was found in the mosque of St. Athanasius, and placed in the British
Museum, we shall give (from Rollin) an account of his funeral; for never
had any monarch one so magnificent!
Alexander died at Babylon. Aridæus, having been deputed by all the
governors and grandees of the kingdom, to take upon himself the care of
his obsequies, had employed two years in preparing every thing that
could render it the most august funeral that had ever been seen. When
all things were ready for the celebration of this mournful ceremonial,
orders were given for the procession to begin. This was preceded by a
great number of pioneers and other workmen, whose office was to make all
the ways practicable, through which the procession was to pass. As soon
as these were levelled, the magnificent chariot, the invention and
design of which raised as much admiration as the immense riches that
glittered all over it, set out from Babylon. The body of the chariot
rested upon two alxetrees, that were inserted into four wheels, made
after the Persian manner; the naves and spokes of which were covered
with gold, and the rounds plated over with iron. The extremities of the
axletrees were made of gold, representing the mouths of lions biting a
dart. The chariot had four draught-poles, to each of which were
harnessed four sets of mules, each set consisting of four of those
animals; so that this chariot was drawn by sixty-four mules. The
strongest of those creatures, and the largest, were chosen on this
occasion. They were adorned with crowns of gold, and collars enriched
with precious stones and golden bells. On this chariot was erected a
pavilion of entire gold, twelve feet wide, and eighteen in length,
supported by columns of the Ionic order, embellished with the leaves of
acanthus. The inside was adorned with a blaze of jewels, disposed in the
form of shells. The circumference was beautified with a fringe of golden
net-work; the threads that composed the texture were an inch in
thickness, and to those were fastened large bells, whose sound was
heard to a great distance. The external decorations were disposed into
four relievos. The first represented Alexander seated in a military
chariot, with a splendid sceptre in his hand, and surrounded, on one
side, with a troop of Macedonians in arms; and on the other, with an
equal number of Persians, armed in their manner. These were preceded by
the king's equerries. In the second were seen elephants completely
harnessed, with a band of Indians seated on the fore part of their
bodies; and on the hinder, another band of Macedonians, armed as in the
day of battle. The third exhibited to the view several squadrons of
horse ranged in military array. The fourth represented ships preparing
for a battle. At the entrance into the pavilion were golden lions, that
seemed to guard the passage. The four corners were adorned with statues
of gold, representing victories, with trophies of arms in their hands.
Under the pavilion was placed a throne of gold of a square form, adorned
with the heads of animals, whose necks were encompassed with golden
circles a foot and a half in breadth; to these were hung crowns that
glittered with the liveliest colours, and such as were carried in
procession at the celebration of sacred solemnities. At the foot of the
throne was placed the coffin of Alexander, formed of beaten gold, and
half filled with aromatic spices and perfumes, as well to exhale an
agreeable odour, as for the preservation of the corpse. A pall of
purple, wrought with gold, covered the coffin. Between this and the
throne the arms of that monarch were disposed in the manner he wore them
while living. The outside of the pavilion was likewise covered with
purple, flowered with gold. The top ended in a very large crown of the
same metal, which seemed to be a composition of olive-branches. The
rays of the sun which darted on this diadem, in conjunction with the
motion of the chariot, caused it to emit a kind of rays like those of
lightning. It may easily be imagined, that, in so long a procession, the
motion of a chariot, loaded like this, would be liable to great
inconveniences. In order, therefore, that the pavilion, with all its
appendages, might, when the chariot moved in any uneven ways, constantly
continue in the same situation, notwithstanding the inequality of the
ground, and the shocks that would frequently be unavoidable, a cylinder
was raised from the middle of each axle-tree, to support the pavilion;
by which expedient the whole machine was preserved steady. The chariot
was followed by the royal guards, all in arms, and magnificently
arrayed. The multitude of spectators of this solemnity is hardly
credible; but they were drawn together as well by their veneration for
the memory of Alexander, as by the magnificence of this funeral pomp,
which had never been equalled in the world. There was a current
prediction, that the place where Alexander should be interred, would be
rendered the most happy and flourishing part of the whole earth. The
governors contested with each other, for the disposal of a body that was
to be attended with such a glorious prerogative. The affection,
Perdiccas entertained for his country, made him desirous that the corpse
should be conveyed to Æge, in Macedonia, where the remains of its kings
were usually deposited. Other places were likewise proposed, but the
preference was given to Egypt. Ptolemy, who had such extraordinary and
recent obligations to the king of Macedonia, was determined to signalise
his gratitude on this occasion. He accordingly set out with a numerous
guard of his best troops, in order to meet the procession, and advanced
as far as Syria. When he had joined the attendants on the funeral, he
prevented them from interring the corpse in the temple of Jupiter Ammon,
as they had proposed. It was therefore deposited, first, in the city of
Memphis, and from thence was conveyed to Alexandria. Ptolemy raised a
magnificent temple to the memory of this monarch, and rendered him all
the honours which were usually paid to demi-gods and heroes by Pagan
antiquity.
Freinshemius, in his supplement to Livy, relates, after Leo the
African[15], that the tomb of Alexander the Great was still to be seen
in his time, and that it was reverenced by the Mohammedans, as the
monument, not only of an illustrious king, but of a great prophet. [16]
The ancient city, together with its suburbs, was about seven leagues in
length; and Diodorus informs us that the number of its inhabitants
amounted to above 300,000, consisting only of the citizens and freemen;
but that, reckoning the slaves and foreigners, they were allowed, at a
moderate computation, to be upwards of a million. These vast numbers of
people were enticed to settle here by the convenient situation of the
place for commerce; since, besides the advantage of a communication to
the eastern countries by the canal cut out of the Nile into the Red Sea,
it had two very spacious and commodious ports, capable of containing the
shipping of all the then trading nations in the world.
The harbour, called Portus Eunostus, lay in the centre of the city; thus
rendering the ships secure, not only by nature but by art. The figure of
this harbour was a circle, the entrance being nearly closed up by two
artificial moles, which left a passage for two ships only to pass
abreast. At the western extremity of one of these moles stood the
celebrated tower called Pharos. The ruins of it are buried in the sea,
at the bottom of which, in a calm day, one may easily distinguish large
columns and several vast pieces of marble, which give sufficient proofs
of the magnificence of the building in which they were anciently
employed.
This light-house was erected by Ptolemy Philadelphus. Its architect was
Sostratus of Cnidos; its cost was 180,000_l._ sterling, and it was
reckoned one of the seven wonders of the world[17]. It was a large
square structure built of white marble, on the top of which a fire was
constantly kept burning, in order to guide ships by night. Pharos was
originally an island at the distance nearly of a mile from the
continent, but was afterwards joined to it by a causeway like that of
Tyre.
This Pharos was destroyed, and, in its stead, a square castle was built
without taste or ornament, and incapable of sustaining the fire of a
single vessel of the line: at present, in a space of two leagues, walled
round, nothing is to be seen but marble columns lying in the dust, and
sawed in pieces; for the Turks make mill-stones of them; together with
the remains of pilasters, capitals, obelisks, and mountains of ruins
heaped on each other.
Alexandria had one peculiar advantage over all others:--Dinocrates,
considering the great scarcity of good water in this country, dug very
spacious vaults, which, having communication with all parts of the city,
furnished its inhabitants with one of the chief necessaries of life.
These vaults were divided into capacious reservoirs, or cisterns, which
were filled, at the time of the inundation of the Nile, by a canal cut
out of the Canopic branch, entirely for that purpose. The water was, in
that manner, preserved for the remainder of the year; and being refined
by the long settlement, was not only the clearest, but the wholesomest
of any in Egypt. This grand work is still remaining; whence the present
city, though built out of the ruins of the ancient one, still enjoys the
benefactions of Alexander, its founder.
A street[18], two thousand feet wide, began at the Marine gate, and
ended at the gate of Canopus, adorned with magnificent houses, temples,
and public edifices. Through this extent of prospect the eye was never
satiated with admiring the marble, the porphyry, and the obelisks which
were destined hereafter to adorn Rome and Constantinople. This street
was indeed the finest the world ever saw.
Besides all the private buildings constructed with porphyry and marble,
there was an admirable temple to Serapis, and another to Neptune; also a
theatre, an amphitheatre, gymnasium, and circus. The materials had all
the perfection which the experience of one thousand years could afford;
and the wealth and exertions, not only of Egypt but of Asia. The place
was extensive and magnificent; and a succession of wise and good princes
rendered it, by means of Egyptian materials and Grecian taste, one of
the richest and most perfect cities the world has ever beheld.
The palace occupied one quarter of the city; but within its precincts
were a museum, extensive groves, and a temple containing the sepulchre
of Alexander.
This city was also famous for a temple erected to the God Serapis, in
which was a statue which the natives of Sinope (in Pontus) had bartered,
in a season of famine, for a supply of corn. The temple was called the
Serapion; and Ammianus Marcellinus assures us[19], that it surpassed all
the temples then in the world for beauty and magnificence, with the sole
exception of the Capitol at Rome.
Ptolemy Soter made this city the metropolitan seat of arts and sciences.
He founded the museum, the most ancient and most sumptuous temple ever
erected by any monarch, in honour of learning; he filled it with men of
abilities, and made it an asylum for philosophers of all descriptions,
whose doctrines were misunderstood, and whose persons were persecuted;
in whose unfeigned tribute of grateful praise he has found a surer road
to everlasting renown, than his haughty nameless predecessors, who
pretended to immortality, and braved both heaven and corroding time by
the solid structure of their pyramids.
He founded also a library, which was considerably augmented by Ptolemy
Philadelphus, and by the magnificence of his successors, was at length
increased to 700,000 volumes.
In Cæsar's time, part of this library,--that portion which was situated
in the quarter of the city called the Bruchion,--was consumed by fire; a
conflagration which caused the loss of not fewer than 400,000 volumes.
This library, a short time after, received the increase of 200,000
volumes from Pergamus; Antony having given that library to Cleopatra. It
was afterwards ransacked several times; but it was still a numerous and
very celebrated library at the time in which it was destroyed by the
Saracens, viz. A.D. 642; a history of which we shall soon have to
relate.
The manner in which this library was originally collected, may be judged
of, in no small degree, by the following relation:--All the Greek and
other books that were brought into Egypt were seized and sent to the
Museum, where they were transcribed by persons employed for that
purpose; the copies were then delivered to the proprietors, and the
originals were deposited in the library. Ptolemy Evergetes, for
instance, borrowed the works of Sophocles, Euripides, and Æschylus, of
the Athenians, and only returned them the copies, which he had caused to
be transcribed in as beautiful a manner as possible; and he likewise
presented them with fifteen talents, equal to fifteen thousand crowns,
for the originals, which he kept.
On the death of Cleopatra, Egypt was reduced into a province of the
Roman empire, and governed by a prefect sent from Rome. Alexander
founded the city in 3629; and the reign of the Ptolemies, who succeeded
him, lasted to the year of the world 3974.
The city, in the time of Augustus, must have been very beautiful; for
when that personage entered it, he told the natives, who had acted
against him, that he pardoned them all; first, out of respect to the
name of their founder; and, secondly, on account of the beauty of their
city. This beauty and opulence, however, were not without their
corresponding evils; for Quintilian informs us, that as Alexandria
improved in commerce and in opulence, her inhabitants grew so effeminate
and voluptuous, that the word Alexandrine became proverbial, to express
softness, indelicacy, and immodest language.
Egypt having become a province of Rome, some of the emperors endeavoured
to revive in it a love of letters, and enriched it by various
improvements. The emperor Caligula was inclined to favour the
Alexandrians, because they manifested a readiness to confer divine
honours upon him. He even conceived the horrid design of massacring the
chief senators and knights of Rome (A.D. 40), and then of abandoning the
city, and of settling at Alexandria; the prosperity and wealth of which
in the time of Aurelian was so great, that, after the defeat of Zenobia,
a single merchant of this city undertook to raise and pay an army out of
the profits of his trade!
The rapid rise of the power of the Moslems, and the religious discord
which prevailed in Egypt, levelled a death-blow at the grandeur of this
powerful city, whose prosperity had been unchecked from the time of its
foundation;--upwards of nine hundred and seventy years. Amrou, the
lieutenant of Omar, king of the Saracens, having entered Egypt, and
taken Pelusium, Babylon, and Memphis, laid siege to Alexandria, and
after fourteen months carried the city by assault, and all Egypt
submitted to the yoke of the Caliphs. The standard of Mahomet was
planted on the walls of Alexandria A.D. 640. Abulfaragius, in his
history of the tenth dynasty, gives the following account of this
catastrophe:--John Philoponus, a famous Peripatetic philosopher, being
at Alexandria when the city was taken by the Saracens, was admitted to
familiar intercourse with Amrou, the Arabian general, and presumed to
solicit a gift, inestimable in his opinion but contemptible in that of
the barbarians, and this was the royal library. Amrou was inclined to
gratify his wish, but his rigid integrity scrupled to alienate the least
object without the Caliph's consent. He accordingly wrote to Omar, whose
well-known answer was dictated by the ignorance of a fanatic.
Amrou wrote thus to his master, "I have taken the great city of the
West. It is impossible for me to enumerate the variety of its riches and
beauty; I shall content myself with observing, that it contains 4000
palaces, 4000 baths, 400 theatres or places of amusement, 12,000 shops
for the sale of vegetable food, and 40,000 tributary Jews." He then
related what Philoponus had requested of him. "If these writings of the
Greeks," answered the bigoted barbarian, his master, "agree with the
Koran, or book of God, they are useless, and need not be preserved; if
they disagree they are pernicious, and ought to be destroyed." This
valuable repository, therefore, was devoted to the flames, and during
six months the volumes of which it consisted supplied fuel to the four
thousand baths, which gave health and cleanliness to the city. "No
complaint," says a celebrated moralist (Johnson), "is more frequently
repeated among the learned, than that of the waste made by time among
the labours of antiquity. Of those who once filled the civilised world
with their renown nothing is now left but their names, which are left
only to raise desires that never can be satisfied, and sorrow which
never can be comforted. Had all the writings of the ancients been
faithfully delivered down from age to age, had the _Alexandrian
library_ been spared, and the Palatine repositories remained unimpaired,
how much might we have known of which we are now doomed to be ignorant,
how many laborious inquiries and dark conjectures, how many collations
of broken hints and mutilated passages might have been spared! We should
have known the successions of princes, the revolutions of empires, the
actions of the great, and opinions of the wise, the laws and
constitutions of every state, and the arts by which public grandeur and
happiness are acquired and preserved. We should have traced the progress
of life, seen colonies from distant regions take possession of European
deserts, and troops of savages settled into communities by the desire of
keeping what they had acquired; we should have traced the progress and
utility, and travelled upward to the original of things by the light of
history, till in remoter times it had glimmered in fable, and at last
been left in darkness."--"For my own part," says Gibbon, "I am strongly
tempted to deny both the fact and the consequences." Dr. Drake also is
disposed to believe, that the privations we have suffered have been
occasioned by ignorance, negligence, and intemperate zeal, operating
uniformly for centuries, and not through the medium of either concerted
or accidental conflagration[20].
The dominion of the Turks, and the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope,
in 1499, completed its ruin; and from that time it has remained in
decay. Its large buildings fell into ruins, and under a government which
discouraged even the appearance of wealth, no person would venture to
repair them, and mean habitations were constructed in lieu of them, on
the sea-coast. Since that dismal epoch Egypt has, century after century,
sunk deeper and deeper into a state of perfect neglect and ruin. In
recent times, however, it has been under the immediate despotic rule of
Mehemet Ali, nominally a pasha of the sultan of Constantinople, and a
man apparently able and willing to do much towards restoring
civilisation to the place of his birth.
The remains, in the opinion of some, have been greatly magnified. One
writer[21], for instance, states, "The present state of Alexandria
affords a scene of magnificence and desolation. In the space of two
leagues, inclosed by walls, nothing is seen but the remains of
pilasters, of capitals, and of obelisks, and whole mountains of
shattered columns and monuments of ancient art, heaped upon one another,
and accumulated to a height even greater than that of the houses."
Another writer[22] says, "Alexandria now exhibits every mark by which it
could be recognised as one of the principal monuments of the
magnificence of the conqueror of Asia, the emporium of the East, and the
chosen theatre of the far-sought luxuries of the Roman triumvirs and the
Egyptian queen."
According to Sonnini, columns subverted and scattered about; a few
others still upright but isolated; mutilated statues, fragments of every
species, overspread the ground which it once occupied. "It is impossible
to advance a step, without kicking, if I may use the expression, against
some of its wrecks. It is the hideous theatre of destruction the most
horrible. The soul is saddened on contemplating those remains of
grandeur and magnificence; and it is raised into indignation against the
barbarians, who dared to apply a sacrilegious hand to monuments, which
time, the most pitiless of destroyers, would have respected." "So
little," says Dr. Clarke, "are we acquainted with these valuable
remains, that not a single excursion for purposes of discovery has yet
been begun; nor is there any thing published with regard to its modern
history, excepting the observations that have resulted from the hasty
survey, made of its forlorn and desolated havens by a few travellers
whose transitory visits ended almost with the days of their
arrival[23]."
"On arriving at Alexandria," says Mr. Wilkinson, "the traveller
naturally enquires where are the remains of that splendid city, which
was second only to Rome itself, and whose circuit of fifteen miles
contained a population of three hundred thousand inhabitants and an
equal number of slaves; and where the monuments of its former greatness?
He has heard of Cleopatra's Needle and Pompey's Pillar, from the days of
his childhood, and the fame of its library, the Pharos, the temple of
Serapis and of those philosophers and mathematicians, whose venerable
names contribute to the fame of Alexandria, even more than the extent of
its commerce or the splendour of the monuments, that once adorned it,
are fresh in his recollection;--and he is surprised, in traversing
mounds which mark the site of this vast city, merely to find scattered
fragments or a few isolated columns, and here and there the vestiges of
buildings, or the doubtful direction of some of the main streets."
Though the ancient boundaries, however, cannot be determined, heaps
of rubbish are on all sides visible; whence every shower of rain, not to
mention the industry of the natives in digging, discovers pieces of
precious marble, and sometimes ancient coins, and fragments of
sculpture. Among the last may be particularly mentioned the statues of
Marcus Aurelius and Septimius Severus.
The present walls are of Saracenic structure. They are lofty; being in
some places more than forty feet in height, and apparently no where so
little as twenty. These furnish a sufficient security against the
Bedouins, who live part of the year on the banks of the canal, and often
plunder the cattle in the neighbourhood. The few flocks and herds, which
are destined to supply the wants of the city, are pastured on the
herbage, of which the vicinity of the canal favours the growth, and
generally brought in at night when the two gates are shut. "Judge," says
M. Miot, "by Volney's first pages, of the impression which must be made
upon us, by these houses with grated windows; this solitude, this
silence, these camels; these disgusting dogs covered with vermin; these
hideous women holding between their teeth the corner of a veil of coarse
blue cloth to conceal from us their features and their black bosoms. At
the sight of Alexandria and its inhabitants, at beholding these vast
plains devoid of all verdure, at breathing the burning air of the
desert, melancholy began to find its way among us; and already some
Frenchmen, turning towards their country their weary eyes, let the
expression of regret escape them in sighs; a regret which more painful
proofs were soon to render more poignant." And this recals to one's
recollection the description of an Arabic poet, cited by Abulfeda
several centuries ago.
"How pleasant are the banks of the canal of Alexandria; when the
eye surveys them the heart is rejoiced! the gliding boatman,
beholding its towers, beholds canopies ever verdant; the lovely
Aquilon breathes cooling freshness, while he, sportful, ripples up
the surface of its waters; the ample Date, whose flexible head
reclines like a sleeping beauty, is crowned with pendent fruit."
The walls to which we have alluded present nothing curious, except some
ruinous towers; and one of the chief remains of the ancient city is a
colonnade, of which only a few columns remain; and what is called the
amphitheatre, on a rising ground, whence there is a fine view of the
city and port. There is, however, one structure beside particularly
entitled to distinction; and that is generally styled Pompey's Pillar.
Pompey's Pillar, says the author of Egyptian Antiquities, "stands on a
small eminence midway between the walls of Alexandria and the shores of
the lake Mareotis, about three-quarters of a mile from either, quite
detached from any other building. It is of a red granite; but the shaft,
which is highly polished, appears to be of earlier date than the capital
or pedestal, which have been made to correspond. It is of the Corinthian
order; and while some have eulogised it as the finest specimen of that
order, others have pronounced it to be in bad taste. The capital is of
palm leaves, not indented. The column consists only of three pieces--the
capital, the shaft, and the base--and is poised on a centre stone of
breccia, with hieroglyphics on it, less than a fourth of the dimensions
of the pedestal of the column, and with the smaller end downward; from
which circumstance the Arabs believe it to have been placed there by
God. The earth about the foundation has been examined, probably in the
hopes of finding treasures; and pieces of white marble, (which is not
found in Egypt) have been discovered connected to the breccia above
mentioned. It is owing, probably, to this disturbance that the pillar
has an inclination of about seven inches to the south-west. This column
has sustained some trifling injury at the hands of late visiters, who
have indulged a puerile pleasure in possessing and giving to their
friends small fragments of the stone, and is defaced by being daubed
with names of persons, which would otherwise have slumbered unknown to
all save in their own narrow sphere of action; practices which cannot be
too highly censured, and which an enlightened mind would scorn to be
guilty of. It is remarkable, that while the polish on the shaft is still
perfect to the northward, corrosion has begun to affect the southern
face, owing probably to the winds passing over the vast tracts of sand
in that direction. The centre part of the cap-stone has been hollowed
out, forming a basin on the top; and pieces of iron still remaining in
four holes prove that this pillar was once ornamented with a figure, or
some other trophy. The operation of forming a rope-ladder to ascend the
column has been performed several times of late years, and is very
simple: a kite was flown, with a string to the tail, and, when directly
over the pillar, it was dragged down, leaving the line by which it was
flown across the capital. With this a rope, and afterwards a stout
hawser, was drawn over; a man then ascended and placed two more parts of
the hawser, all of which were pulled tight down to a twenty-four-pounder
gun lying near the base (which it was said Sir Sidney Smith attempted to
plant on the top); small spars were then lashed across, commencing from
the bottom, and ascending each as it was secured, till the whole was
complete, when it resembled the rigging of a ship's lower masts. The
mounting this solitary column required some nerve, even in seamen; but
it was still more appalling to see the Turks, with their ample trowsers,
venture the ascent. The view from this height is commanding, and highly
interesting in the associations excited by gazing on the ruins of the
city of the Ptolemies, lying beneath. A theodolite was planted there,
and a round of terrestrial angles taken; but the tremulous motion of the
column affected the quicksilver in the artificial horizon so much as to
preclude the possibility of obtaining an observation for the latitude.
Various admeasurements have been given of the dimensions of Pompey's
Pillar; the following, however, were taken by a gentleman who assisted
in the operation above described:--
Feet In.
Top of the capital to the astragal (one stone) 10 4
Astragal to first plinth (one stone) 67 7
Plinth to the ground 20 11
--------
Whole height 98 10
--------
Measured by a line from the top 99 4
--------
It will be remembered, however, that the pedestal of
the column does not rest on the ground,
Its elevation being 4 6
The height of the column itself is therefore 94 10
Diagonal of the capital 16 11
Circumference of shaft (upper part) 24 2
(lower part) 27 2
Length of side of the pedestal 16 6
Shaw says, that in his time, in expectation of finding a large treasure
buried underneath, a great part of the foundation, consisting of
several fragments of different sorts of stone and marble, had been
removed; so that the whole fabric rested upon a block of white marble
scarcely two yards square, which, upon touching it with a key, sounded
like a bell.
All travellers agree that its present appellation is a misnomer; yet it
is known that a monument of some kind was erected at Alexandria to the
memory of Pompey, which was supposed to have been found in this
remarkable column. Mr. Montague thinks it was erected to the honour of
Vespasian. Savary calls it the Pillar of Severus. Clarke supposes it to
have been dedicated to Hadrian, according to his reading of a
half-effaced inscription in Greek on the west side of the base; while
others trace the name of Diocletian in the same inscription. No mention
occurring of it either in Strabo or Diodorus Siculus, we may safely
infer that it did not exist at that period; and Denon supposes it to
have been erected about the time of the Greek Emperors, or of the
Caliphs of Egypt, and dates its acquiring its present name in the
fifteenth century. It is supposed to have been surmounted with an
equestrian statue. The shaft is elegant and of a good style; but the
capital and pedestal are of inferior workmanship, and have the
appearance of being of a different period.
In respect to the inscription on this pillar, there are two different
readings:--It must, however, be remembered, that many of the letters are
utterly illegible.
TO DIOCLETIANUS AUGUSTUS,
MOST ADORABLE EMPEROR,
THE TUTELAR DEITY OF ALEXANDRIA,
PONTIUS, A PREFECT OF EGYPT,
CONSECRATES THIS.