A BIBLIOTECA DE ALEXANDRIA - Documentário (1996)

[Music] over 2,000 years ago this Stark sprawling ruin was probably the most important Center for Learning in the world here Men first figured out the size of the world and the number of stars in the sky there were Laboratories Gardens a medical school and over half a million books the ancient library in Alexandria Egypt educated some of the most Brilliant Minds ever known these corridors May hold the secrets of centuries of knowledge the seeds of our present day culture was swn these old Gallery rooms in Alexandria perhaps the most surprising thing about the library at

Alexandria is that it lasted for over six centuries and yet this may be All That Remains [Music] the founding of the library in Alexandria has been called the beginning of modern history more than just a library it was the first world Research Center for hundreds of years Alexandria invited dignitaries from around the world to study in its Library Halls resident Scholars could live eat learn and work with visitors who brought important new information to Alexandria apparently all that is left of the legendary library is this modern excavation called the sarum a secondary structure built when

the original Library began to overflow with books and people the serapium exists only to tease us with a glimpse of the library's illustrious past the amazing thing about the library at Alex Andria is that it was the most important place of learning in the ancient world and we don't know where it was or where it is now we don't know what it looked like we don't know the details of what books did it have we don't know everybody who was there there's more that we don't know than we do know yet it was the most

important event perhaps in the intellectual history of man [Music] over 3 million people live in present day Alexandria mostly followers of the Islamic faith the old streets are crowded with shops and Apartments built up alongside ancient ruins 130 Mi Northwest of Cairo Alexandria is Egypt's second largest city and home to her main port in the 4th Century BC this fine open Harbor and its island of fos attracted the illustrious conqueror Alexander the Great when Alexander founded the city in 332 BC he chose it for location the Mediterranean Sea the island of feros and proximity to

the River Nile made for a good Naval Base the natural Harbor allowed easy access access to all the nations in the fast growing Mediterranean widespread trade and other civilizations were accessible Alexandria was ideally suited to be the world's new center of thought culture and activity as Alexander the Great looked out into the empty Harbor what did he Envision as the future for the city that would bear his name and why would the warrior Alexander even care about a library long before Alexander entered Egypt generations of Greeks struggled with early riddles of existence it was the

beginning of man's understanding of the natural [Music] world investigation of everything was important Athens Greece became the brain power center of the old Greek World conversation and debate were common pastimes public speaking produced public Scholars who became [Music] celebrities in the fifth and 4th centuries BC men like Socrates Plato and Aristotle were working in Athens they were the popular and controversial policy makers of the day their early teachings are the foundation for modern thought but what did these early in uals have in common with one of History's finest generals Alexander the Great the tradition is

that Alexander was taught by Aristotle and Aristotle of course was taught by Plato who in turn was taught by Socrates Plato and Socrates believed that the senses mislead you that if you can see it you shouldn't really believe it they believed in Eternal unchanging truths which are known by the mind not by the senses Aristotle turned this around Aristotle said no nothing enters the Mind except through the census and he in turn taught Alexander the Great Alexander was born to the ruler of Macedon the most rapidly expanding state in the Greek World naturally King Phillip

wanted the best tutor in the land for his royal son so at age 13 Alexander the soon to be great was turned over to arist of Macedonia the philosopher filled the young warrior with a passionate love of learning educated men are as much Superior to uneducated men as the living are to the Dead the fate of Empires depends on the education of Youth Aristotle the philosopher 4th Century BC Alexander valued knowledge as a tool for power on his quest to conquer the world a decade later Alexander carried Aristotle's copy of Homer's Iliad with him into

battle Warrior was also a poet working his massive Greek army across Asia to Western India the gifted young Commander inspired admiration his campaign to fend off Persian rule shot like a spear through the ancient world winning Alexander the support of armies kingdoms and [Music] countries in the fall of 332 BC Alexander crossed into Egypt early in his world campaign Egypt was then a Persian [Music] Province Egypt hailed Alexander as a liberator from Persian oppression welcomed as a ruler Alexander was crowned pharaoh of Egypt for almost 3,000 years Egypt had been ruled by Godlike pharaohs those

ancient Pharaohs were the link between their mortal subjects and the gods themselves Egyptian pharaoh were thought to be gods in life and after [Music] death but Alexander was Greek not Egyptian he had no guarantee of an afterlife where would Alexander the Great find [Music] immortality deep into the desert at sewa Alexander sought the Oracle of the Hidden one the great Egyptian god Ammon Legend says Alexander had a mysterious secret was he The Offspring not of mortal King Phillip but son of the god Ammon himself [Music] he went to siwa and asked the Oracle of God

Ammon if this was true and in a dream he saw that the god Ammon embraced his mother so this was an assurance a confirmation of the claim and then he asked his father God Ammon uh if he would require him to do anything and the answer came also in a dream King I am God Ammon speaking to you go and found an illustrious City at the sight of the island farms he immediately carried this out in the dream the god Ammon embraced Alexander's mother while in reality Alexander embraced Egypt and founded Alexandria in 332 BC

he decreed his City would be the source of learning in the Known World cultural magnet drawing on Talent from afar at the Heart of the City would be a teaching Institute on which other Empires could be built a warehouse of Science and literature the library would be a self-contained Universe of mental stimulation Architects laid out the plans for the new city while after only 6 months in Egypt Alexander continued his aggressive Adventures elsewhere it seemed as though he would conquer the world but in 323 BC weakened by wounds and fever possibly poisoned Alexander the Great

suddenly died what would happen to his fair City would new rulers share Alexander's lust for knowledge the library at Alexandria had yet to be built when his namesake died would the world ever see his [Music] vision with the founding of Alexandria a bright new period of Greek history began it was a dawn of new leadership and a new way of [Music] thinking when Alexander the Great died his Egyptian kingdom was taken over by tmy Alexander's most trusted General who would build the library Alexander [Music] envisioned Tommy the started a Dynasty series of Kings from the

same family who would rule rule Egypt for almost 300 years solomy the first made Alexandria the capital of Egypt but still the city faced powerful competition from ruler generals of other countries they competed with one another in power in wealth and grandia one field of competition was culture and tmy wanted his City not to be only a capital of a powerful country but a center of Enlightenment of knowledge and of learning the original alexandrian citizens were local Egyptians the Macedonian guard large Jewish community and streams of Greek immigrants thanks to Tommy Alexandria immediately began to

attract influential Scholars from around the Greek [Music] World Tommy the first was a man of iron will and intelligence he surrounded himself with a circle of important men advanced in the fields of literature philosophy and [Music] science the architect Demetrius of feron helped Tommy lay plans for the new Center bricks broken temples and battered sphinxes lay at top the only surviving portion of the ancient institution the cpum or daughter library is thought to have been built Inland from the main library and Museum but where was the main part of the structure located the Library of

Alexandria now offers more questions than it does answers one of the great mysteries of the Library of Alexandria is where was it uh nobody's sure where it was uh we think it was by the water uh and that's a good bet for where it is now under the water uh we also don't know what it looked like there are no contemporary accounts that really give a description of what the library was like so we really wonder what did the thing look like did it have two stories did it have three stories was it dark was

it well lit uh there are a lot of things we don't know about the library the main library was probably built close to the the harbor in the Royal Greek section of Alexandria it was thought to be in or near the palace called the Bron or Museum its research was royally funded many local Scholars were on the king's payroll the tommies were understandably proud of their Library there was a strong sense of obligation on the part of the tmes to Foster learning which is quite remarkable in a way it always is uh when their real

concerns were with power security of the Dynasty and the problems of Egypt which are immense one of the things Tom me did was collect books a very Greek thing to do collect as many books as possible and he did it with a Vengeance visitors arrived with their versions of famous older literary texts sometimes agents were sent abroad to bring back new works on occasion manuscripts were donated even Aristotle's library was willed to the Library of Alexandria we are told also that there was a law that any traveler who set sail into this into the harbor

of Alexandria was searched for books not for drugs but for books and if a book was found it was taken to the library if there was no copy of it it was confiscated and the traveler was compensated so they did wonderful things in order to uh acquire books but the normal method of acquiring books was of course by purchasing them and there were Marts and markets for books so in this way Alexandria acquired the largest colle collection of books ever existed in Antiquity how many Scrolls were eventually contained within the libraries at Alexandria Tommy's goal

was to have every existing written work in the Greek world and Beyond the secondary collection located in the cpum alone was said to hold 300,000 books but over the course of history The Collection grew even larger we don't know how many books there were the best Authority I know of says about 400 500,000 which is an awfully big Library by anybody's standards but counting books is a very inexact science countless ancient manuscripts were not just stored away at the Alexandria library they were used as research and reference for other newer Scholars and Priceless books were

copied by local scribes and traded for books from other parts of the ancient world some of the most significant work in history could have been lost forever were it not for Scrolls copied in Alexandria the main significance of the library and the museum at Alexandria is that it did what a great Library does it disseminates knowledge when you go in and take a book out of the library you're performing one of the great basic cultural functions and the library is doing its job each piece had to be cataloged perhaps cross referenced and put away Librarians

had to be able to retrieve the works easily and scores of new works were coming in all the time along with more material for the library came more visitors Scholars were drawn to Alexandria which in turn enhanced its reputation as a cuttingedge Center for Learning and knowledge herophilus the anatomist established an in-house medical school at the Bron before Alexandria doctors used animals to research human anatomy long before anesthetized operations were performed it was rumored that scientists in Alexandria operated directly on living men no evidence for this charge exists but herophilus was among the first to

perform medical examinations on humans after their [Music] death the Greeks were prohibited from doing dissection by tradition it was prohibited to cut the human body it was almost a sacrilege for the Greeks but on Egyptian soil you had the tradition of the Egyptian EMB bombers who for 3,000 years had been dissecting bodies so at the medical school in Alexandria for the first time Physicians could practice on human cadavers and in Greece in Athens for example there were Physicians who often said I wish I had studied Alexandria because they could do human dissection so the library

in Alexandria was in a sense more free than any other place especially the medical school and this was an important feature of [Music] it besides literature and Medicine the alexandrian research under the Tommy's favorite mathematics founder of geometry lived in Alexandria uid published a textbook that replaced all previous efforts and he also opened a school the geometry you studied in grade school is of course from the Alexandria library uclid who codified the results of the basic theorems that others had made and you will still see in an ordinary everyday paperback introduction to Geometry the name

of one of the men who worked and studied at the library little is known personally about uid but one Legend remains when uid showed his new work to King Tommy the King asked if there was an easier way to do geometry uid was said to reply there is no Royal Road Tommy worked tirelessly to build the library but as he Grew Older he looked to his son to govern the land of the Pharos and when Tommy died in 283 BC Tommy II became the sole ruler of Egypt great toic Dynasty would continue almost 300 years

until Cleopatra's death how would the tommies leave their mark on the Library of Alexandria [Music] [Music] the second Tommy fulfilled the wishes of his father and Alexander the Great and the Library of Alexandria flourished in the 3rd Century BC Tommy II ruled with his sister and under their reign the library and Museum grew and prospered it was the Golden Age of Alexandria besides expanding the library and Museum toomy II built the last of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World a mammoth lighthouse on the island of feros today the foundation of the ancient Lighthouse is

buried beneath this comparatively modern Islamic structure the military fort kayad Bay but in toic times travelers to Alexandria viewed the first architecturally designed lighthouse in history a three tiered Marvel of construction over 400 ft tall it took vast amounts of fuel to fire up the light of house the Ancients may have burned animal dung to send a powerful Beacon of Welcome out to the world from [Music] Alexandria Sailors Guided by the lighthous were drawn into the library what Treasures would they find in its Bounty of Scrolls the history of Egypt would be typical of the

kind of thing that would be in the library histories and records and literature would be an example of the kind of Records necessary for a scholar to do research with the difficulty was of course that there were two languages involved Egyptian and Greek but the basic language of the libraries was almost completely Greek for this was a Greek ruler a Greek Court a Greek culture imposed on the incredible old civilization of Egypt the library was a storehouse for all types of literature all the great Greek philosophers must have been represented including the writings of diogenes

diogenes had been inspired by a young peasant to live in Simplicity like the young man diynes even discarded his drinking cup in favor of using just his hands diynes then stripped himself of all worldly Goods he gathered a group of like-minded thinkers known as the cynics and documented their critical views of ancient Greek society diogenes believed that no man could be trusted Legend tells us of his lifelong unsuccessful search for an honest man diynes looked all over town in broad daylight with a lantern to prove his cynical point the philosophy of diogenes the cynic was

but a fraction of the library's immense collection the library in Alexandria was really unique in an important way it was eclectic they wanted everything it wasn't just Greek culture that they were collecting they wanted Babylonian texts they wanted wanted Turkish texts they wanted everything they could get they wanted the Hebrew Bible were parts of the Bible written at Alexandria according to Legend the earliest Greek translation of the Old Testament was written in Alexandria under the guidance of Tommy II he is said to have requested 70 Jewish Scholars to simultaneously translate and copy the Hebrew Books

of law the text was in Hebrew but in Alexandria there was a great and very large Jewish Community it seemed that the that Community was very quickly heliz and that Hebrew was no longer comprehensible to them so a Greek version was required and it was made in Alexandria named for the number of Scholars who copied it the septu aant made the Old Testament text accessible to a wide range of people and formed the basis for countless other translations of the Bible the Bible and all of the books in those ancient times were written on Papyrus

Scrolls the word paper comes from the Egyptian Papyrus the plant from which Scrolls were made the pyus grew along the banks of the Nile the Ancients pressed wet strips of reads side by side they were pounded flat and when dry could be written on with early pen and [Music] ink it took a long time for a scribe to finish a book and I don't think they looked on labor of course the way we do we would go crazy trying to copy another book in long hand Papyrus but it was a famous profession and some scribes

Rose to be important people of course in those days to be able to read and write was almost magical astrology and astronomy were popular Sciences throughout the existence of the library in Alexandria many ancients believed in the influence of the stars and planets on daily life the belief was of course that as above so below what happened in the heavens influenced what was on Earth so astrology was part of astronomy and astronomers were astrologers and astrologers were astronomers in order to predict what happened on Earth you had to accurately observe what happened above in Alexandria

arist starus first figured out that the Earth revolves around a stationary Sun about a 100 years later the parkus was the first to chart over 1,000 individual Stars he even figured out the length of the solar year correct to within 7 Minutes the library must have been an exciting place to be at I mean this was the closest you had to a government grant where you could just do what you wanted to do and be supported in the air was the sense that study everything for its own sake and just try to put everything together

for figuring out the mysteries of the [Music] universe even as scholars in Alexandria solv the mysteries of the universe the Romans were encroaching on the East would this royally funded Oasis of knowledge survive in a rapidly changing world [Music] in Alexandria another Tommy was crowned king of Egypt in 246 BC Tommy III was a conqueror he traveled the world and returned to Alexandria with Priceless Egyptian Treasures stolen by the Persians 300 years before this act of restoration earned the third tmy the title of benefactor under his Reign the tradition of learning thrived in Alexandria for

another generation about 235 BC The Honorable position of Chief librarian was filled by ostanes in keeping with tradition the influential scholar also served as tutor to the royal family 40-year-old ostanes was skilled in a variety of subjects from poetry to science ostanes is the first one to figure out the circumference of the earth now it's important to note but we were all taught in school that Columbus is the one who showed that the Earth was round educated Greeks knew that the Earth was round well before Columbus even in one of Socrates dialogues he says when

we describe the Earth we know that it's a sphere suspended in the heavens so it was known that the Earth was round the question is how big was it by observing Shadows cast in Alexandria and in the south of Egypt at noon on the same day and calculating the difference between the size of each Shadow and the distance between the two ancient cities eratosthenes was able to figure out the circumference of the earth he said the Earth was 24 4,650 Mi around amazingly he was accurate to within roughly 200 [Music] mil a contemporary of ostanes

called Archimedes was a visitor to Alexandria perhaps the most celebrated of ancient mathematicians our committees studied weights and measures in what we now call physics Archimedes principal on water displacement is still referred to today on discovering this ancient clue to modern science AR comedias is remembered for his Cry of Eureka meaning I have found it on leaving Alexandria Archimedes returned to his homeland in Syracuse Sicily to continue his stud and inventions when Syracuse was conquered in 212 BC Archimedes was killed by Roman soldiers he was said to be in the midst of a math problem

when he was taken away to [Music] Die the library in Alexandria was thriving around 250 BC while the rest of the world was making Landmark strides as [Music] well in the mid3 century BC the Mayan calendar was perfected in the Mexican region of Yucatan while in Rome the public witnessed the first competition of Gladiators and in roads another ancient wonder was built as construction was completed on the 100 foot statue Colossus at the height of its popularity scores and scores of high level mines came through Alexandria but over time the luster of the library began

to fade the rain of the fourth toy marked the beginning of the decline of the Dynasty and of the library [Music] other world's centers of knowledge emerged as replacements near the aan sea the library at pamam was a rival to Alexandria in culture and Splendor and as the influence of the Romans spread out through the world even Egypt's great toic Dynasty came under the threat of Roman rule in 48 BC when the Roman general Julius Caesar came to Egypt the ruler of the land was 19-year-old Queen Cleopatra Cleopatra is perhaps the most famous and fabled

of all the tmes the mythology surrounding Cleopatra begins with her very [Music] Heritage we often think of her as an Egyptian now she was a pure-blooded Greek she was the direct descendant of that Tom me who was one of Alexander's field Commanders she was the undoubted Pharaoh the god Queen of Egypt and she had high intellect and was quite an extraordinary person by any standards Cleopatra faced Julius Caesar without fear although Caesar came to conquer Egypt Queen Cleopatra instead claimed Caesar's heart on their first meeting she was said to have emerged naked before him and

did disarmed the brilliant Roman with her Charming Manner and political Savvy but beyond her seductive nature Cleopatra possessed admirable military skills and a keen [Music] intelligence the important thing is that Cleopatra was really an intellectual of the of all the tommies Cleopatra was the only one who could speak Egyptian it was known that she could greet the people who came to her Court in their own languages and probably when Caesar came and when Anthony came she could talk to them in Latin so Cleopatra would have had an active interest in the library almost certainly as

an intellectual there are even Traditions that Cleopatra wrote Works which might have been in the [Music] library it was during the reign of Cleopatra that we made discover the first Clues to the beginning of the destruction of The Great Library at Alexandria when Cleopatra ra struggled for rulership of Egypt against her co-ruler and brother Caesar sided with Cleopatra and found himself embroiled in an alexandrian Civil War but Caesar's Navy was no match for the fine alexandrian vessels and soon he was surrounded in the harbor Caesar found himself encircled resorted to the use of fire and

he set fire in the enemies ships the fire destroyed ships at Sea and in the docks and here the account of Caesar himself stops a century later we have more details that the fire was not limited to the ships but extended to the closer parts of the city near to the hub and plut who knew Alexandria very well and who visited Alexandria says that the fire extended from the docks to The Great Library of [Music] Alexandria according to the ancient historian Plutarch the library was accidentally destroyed by a fire which spread from the harbor but

some Modern historians believe the fire destroyed warehouses containing only a portion of the alexandrian scroll collection did the Library of Alexandria Rise From the Ashes to continue its tradition of [Music] teaching after Caesar's death in 44 BC his successor Mark Anthony offered Queen Cleopatra thousands of books purchased from the Rival library at paman this offering was perhaps made to replace the books burned by C Cesar Mark Anthony like Caesar before him sided with Cleopatra against the opposition in Alexandria but in 31 BC the two were defeated at the sea Battle of acum Mark Anthony committed

suicide and his lover Queen Cleopatra soon followed suit Legend tells us she placed a snake to her breast and soon after being bitten by the asp succumbed to its poison and [Music] died more probably Cleopatra drank a poison which killed her but whatever the cause the toic dynasty which had founded and funded the Library of Alexandria ended with the death of Cleopatra in 30 [Music] BC If Civil War in Alexandria and the demise of a dynasty could not destroy the tremendous Library what could with the end of toic rule in 30 BC Alexandria became the

capital of a Roman province claimed by the grand nephew of Julius Caesar Augustus Caesar who was the first Roman [Music] Emperor by then Alexandria was home to more than 300,000 people the city itself enjoyed a Resurgence of energy which had been absent in the last half century but under Roman influence the library did not flourish as it had in the [Music] past the Romans had a different concept of learning than the Greeks um they weren't into it for its own intellectual Enterprise for the sensuousness of just pure learning of pure reason so the Romans when

they come in they love the trappings uh they like being mummified they love the idea of immortality ity but supporting the library is another thing but still the Library of Alexandria continued to produce Scholars bent on Discovery Claudius toy a Roman of Greek desent was born around the end of the first century ad he was educated at the library and Museum and published books on world geography and science using the work of hipparchus before him Claudius wrote volumes of works on astronomy and astrology Claudius promoted the idea that the Earth was the center of the

solar system this became known as the toic system of astronomy and was used up through the 16th [Music] century I know that I am mortal and ephemeral but when I scan the circling spirals of the Stars no longer do I touch Earth with my feet but sit with Zeus himself and take my fill of the ambrosial food of the Gods Claudius [Music] tmy Claudius tmy lived during a relatively peaceful time in Roman history but by 200 ad Alexandria faced Invasion and plunder from abroad the most important days of learning and knowledge had passed from the

a great City forever the story of what precisely caus the overall destruction of the library may be lost to time accounts from various sources conflict with one another and with modern historians the subject remains [Music] controversial by 400 ad paganism was outlawed and Christianity prevailed as the official religion of the Roman Empire the emperor theodosius ordered the destruction of all monuments and temples which did not honor Christianity Pagan Scholars were murdered in the streets and during a time of constant ethnic confrontation and Rebellion the library may have been destroyed by the Christians in 616 Alexandria

was overtaken when the Persians conquered Egypt that same Century then brought Arab conquest of the land of the Pharaohs and with it the Islamic religion of Muhammad was this the point in history the library was finally [Music] destroyed I think most people today who studied the problem would say that the real destruction came when the Great Muslim Army crossed the Delta took and sacked the [Music] city Alexandria surrendered to the Arabs who decreed that if the library's contents contradicted the Islamic faith the book should be destroyed and if they supported the Islamic faith the books

were unnecessary and should be destroyed either way Legend tells us that the Arab rulers ordered all of the books in The alexandrian Collection to be burned all of the stories surrounding the decline and destruction of the alexandrian library May combine to provide the truth perhaps the great institution died by [Music] degrees Caesar's fire here the lack of funding there the Christian Revolution Muslim invasion and finally the coastal climate of the fine Port City may have contributed to the loss of the largest collection of Scrolls in Antiquity whatever may have remained could have just [Music] disintegrated

perhaps what is important is not how the library disappeared but that it ever existed I think the wonderful thing about the Library of Alexandria is that they did it that the tommies were willing to support this group of Scholars that didn't do anything for the Greek economy they didn't bring in money they didn't make any contribution to the tmy lifestyle but they still supported it it was a sense of learning for its own sake and that's wonderful Legacy of the library in Alexandria is our modern-day world Research Center there 2,000 years ago scholarship was a

shared Endeavor in which great minds from all over could work together to solve the mysteries of the age the legacy of Alexandria is tied into the very origin of modern thought [Music] [Music]