This celebrated collection of books was first
founded by Ptolemy Soter, for the use of the academy, or society of
learned men, which he had founded at Alexandria. Beside the books which
he procured, his son, Ptolemy Philadelphus, added many more, and left in
this library at his death a hundred thousand volumes; and the succeeding
princes of this race enlarged it still more, till at length the books
lodged in it amounted to the number of seven hundred thousand volumes.
The method by which they are said to have collected these books was
this: they seized all the books that were brought by the Greeks or other
foreigners into Egypt, and sent them to the academy, or museum, where
they were transcribed by persons employed for that purpose. The
transcripts were then delivered to the proprietors, and the originals
laid up in the library. Ptolemy Euergetes, for instance, borrowed of the
Athenians the works of Sophocles, Euripides, and Æschylus, and only
returned them the copies, which he caused to be transcribed in as
beautiful a manner as possible; the originals he retained for his own
library, presenting the Athenians with fifteen talents for the exchange,
that is, with three thousand pounds sterling and upwards. As the museum
was at first in the quarter of the city called Bruchion, the library was
placed there; but when the number of books amounted to four hundred
thousand volumes, another library, within the Serapeum, was erected by
way of supplement to it, and, on that account, called the daughter of
the former. The books lodged in this increased to the number of three
hundred thousand volumes; and these two made up the number of seven
hundred thousand volumes, of which the royal libraries of the Ptolemies
were said to consist. In the war which Julius Cæsar waged with the
inhabitants of Alexandria, the library of Bruchion was accidentally, but
unfortunately, burnt. But the library in Serapeum still remained, and
there Cleopatra deposited the two hundred thousand volumes of the
Pergamean library with which she was presented by Marc Antony. These,
and others added to them from time to time, rendered the new library
more numerous and considerable than the former; and though it was
plundered more than once during the revolutions which happened in the
Roman empire, yet it was as frequently supplied with the same number of
books, and continued, for many ages, to be of great fame and use, till
it was burnt by the Saracens, A. D. 642. Abulpharagius, in his history
of the tenth dynasty, gives the following account of this catastrophe:
John Philoponus, surnamed the Grammarian, 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 consent of the caliph. He
accordingly wrote to Omar, whose well known answer was dictated by the
ignorance of a fanatic: “If these writings of the Greeks 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.” The
sentence of destruction was executed with blind obedience: the volumes
of paper or parchment were distributed to the four thousand baths of the
city; and such was their number, that six months were barely sufficient
for the consumption of this precious fuel.
founded by Ptolemy Soter, for the use of the academy, or society of
learned men, which he had founded at Alexandria. Beside the books which
he procured, his son, Ptolemy Philadelphus, added many more, and left in
this library at his death a hundred thousand volumes; and the succeeding
princes of this race enlarged it still more, till at length the books
lodged in it amounted to the number of seven hundred thousand volumes.
The method by which they are said to have collected these books was
this: they seized all the books that were brought by the Greeks or other
foreigners into Egypt, and sent them to the academy, or museum, where
they were transcribed by persons employed for that purpose. The
transcripts were then delivered to the proprietors, and the originals
laid up in the library. Ptolemy Euergetes, for instance, borrowed of the
Athenians the works of Sophocles, Euripides, and Æschylus, and only
returned them the copies, which he caused to be transcribed in as
beautiful a manner as possible; the originals he retained for his own
library, presenting the Athenians with fifteen talents for the exchange,
that is, with three thousand pounds sterling and upwards. As the museum
was at first in the quarter of the city called Bruchion, the library was
placed there; but when the number of books amounted to four hundred
thousand volumes, another library, within the Serapeum, was erected by
way of supplement to it, and, on that account, called the daughter of
the former. The books lodged in this increased to the number of three
hundred thousand volumes; and these two made up the number of seven
hundred thousand volumes, of which the royal libraries of the Ptolemies
were said to consist. In the war which Julius Cæsar waged with the
inhabitants of Alexandria, the library of Bruchion was accidentally, but
unfortunately, burnt. But the library in Serapeum still remained, and
there Cleopatra deposited the two hundred thousand volumes of the
Pergamean library with which she was presented by Marc Antony. These,
and others added to them from time to time, rendered the new library
more numerous and considerable than the former; and though it was
plundered more than once during the revolutions which happened in the
Roman empire, yet it was as frequently supplied with the same number of
books, and continued, for many ages, to be of great fame and use, till
it was burnt by the Saracens, A. D. 642. Abulpharagius, in his history
of the tenth dynasty, gives the following account of this catastrophe:
John Philoponus, surnamed the Grammarian, 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 consent of the caliph. He
accordingly wrote to Omar, whose well known answer was dictated by the
ignorance of a fanatic: “If these writings of the Greeks 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.” The
sentence of destruction was executed with blind obedience: the volumes
of paper or parchment were distributed to the four thousand baths of the
city; and such was their number, that six months were barely sufficient
for the consumption of this precious fuel.