Library of Alexandria

Library of Alexandria, famous ancient library, considered to have the greatest collection of books in the ancient world. Founded by Ptolemy I Soter, king of Egypt, in the city of Alexandria, it was expanded by his son Ptolemy II Philadelphus early in the 3rd century bc. The scholars in charge included the ablest Alexandrian men of letters of the period. Zenodotus of Ephesus, whose specialty was the classification of poetry, was the first to hold the position of librarian. The poet Callimachus made the first general catalog of the books and apparently was also librarian. The two most noted librarians were Aristophanes of Byzantium and Aristarchus of Samothrace, both great editors and grammarians. In the time of Ptolemy II, according to one historian, the main library in the Alexandrian Museum contained nearly 500,000 volumes, or rolls, and an annex in the Temple of Serapis contained some 43,000 volumes. Most of the writings of antiquity were preserved in these collections from which copies were made and disseminated to libraries throughout the civilized world.

It is largely through such copies that ancient works have survived to modern times, for the Alexandrian library was partially or wholly destroyed on several occasions. In 47 bc, during the civil war between Julius Caesar and the followers of Pompey the Great, Caesar was besieged in Alexandria; a fire that destroyed the Egyptian fleet spread through some stores of books, about 40,000 of which were ruined. A few years later the Roman emperor Mark Antony presented to Cleopatra, queen of Egypt, books from the library of the city of Pergamum, in Asia Minor. According to legend, the library at Alexandria was burned three times: in ad272 (by order of the Roman emperor Lucius Domitius Aurelian), in 391 (under the Roman emperor Theodosius I), and in 640 (by Muslims under the caliph Umar I, 581?-644).