Alexandria (ăl-egz-ăn'dri-a). The Grecian capital of Egypt, founded by and named after Alexander the Great, b.c. 332. It was a noted seaport of Lower Egypt, and was situated on a low, narrow tract of land which divides Lake Mareotis from the Mediterranean, and near the western mouth of the Nile, about 120 miles from the present city of Cairo. Soon after its foundation by Alexander, it became the capital of the Ptolemies and the Grecian kings reigning in Egypt, and one of the most populous and prosperous cities of the East. Its harbor could accommodate vast navies, fitting it to become the commercial metropolis of the entire Eastern world. In front of the city, on the island of Pharos, stood a famous lighthouse, named after the island and noted as one of the seven wonders of the world. Alexandria numbered, in the days of its ancient prosperity, 800,000 inhabitants, half of them slaves, and ranked next to Athens in literature. It had the greatest library of ancient times, which contained upward of 700,000 rolls or volumes. The portion in the museum, consisting of 400,000 volumes, was burnt in b.c. 47. The additional or "new library" in the Serapeum, afterward increased to about 500,000 volumes, including the original 300,000 volumes, was destroyed by the fanatical vandalism of the Saracens in a.d. 640. At Alexandria the Old Testament was translated into the Greek by 70 learned Jews—hence called the "Septuagint"—in the third century before the Christian era. The Alexandrian Greek dialect, known as Hellenistic Greek, was the language used by the early Christian fathers, and is still the study of the biblical scholar In the pages of the New Testament. Alexandria was the birthplace of Apollos, Acts 18:24, and in the apostle Paul's time it carried on an extensive commerce with the countries on the Mediterranean. Acts 6:9; Acts 27:6; Acts 28:11. In Alexandria originated the Arian heresy denying that Jesus Christ was divine, and there Athanasius, the "father of orthodoxy," firmly opposed the false and defended the true doctrine of the deity of our Lord. From a.d. 300 to 600 the city was second only to Rome in size and importance, and was the chief seat of Christian theology. It was conquered by the Saracens under Caliph Omar about a.d. 640, when it began to decline. The rising importance of Constantinople, and the discovery of an ocean passage to India by way of Cape Good Hope, contributed to its further ruin, until it was reduced from a prosperous city of 500,000 to a poor village of only 5000 to 6000 inhabitants. It is now an important city of 240,000 inhabitants—including 50,000 Franks—and is connected with Cairo by a railway, and also with Suez, on the Red Sea. Among the ancient monuments to be seen are the Catacombs, the Column of Diocletian, 94 feet high and named "Pompey's Pillar"—not from the famous Pompey, but from a Roman prefect who erected the column in honor of the emperor Diocletian—and one of the two obelisks or "Needles of Cleopatra," which, however, belong to the time of the Pharaohs and were brought from Heliopolis. The obelisk on the embankment of the Thames, London, and the one in Central Park, New York, once stood at Alexandria.

Bibliography Information
Rice, Edwin Wilbur, DD. Entry for 'Alexandria'. People's Dictionary of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/rpd/a/alexandria.html. 1893.

Bible Dictionaries Alexandria

People's Dictionary of the Bible

Bible Dictionaries
Alexandria