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Library at Alexandria Discovered? 123

Posted by michael from the overdue-books dept.
dustmote writes "According to the BBC, a Polish-Egyptian team believes they may have discovered the Library at Alexandria, including ancient lecture halls or auditoria, in the Bruchion region of the city. It's said by some that the burning of the library set civilization back as much as a thousand years."
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Library at Alexandria Discovered? More

Library at Alexandria Discovered?

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  • Good thing.. (Score:2, Funny)

    by rylin ( 688457 )
    Good thing it set us back 1000 years, otherwise SCO might actually have a case when it comes to "owning unix"

    Proudly pulling random things into context. . .

  • Oh neato! (Score:5, Funny)

    by NanoGator ( 522640 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @04:12PM (#9144231) Homepage Journal
    It's kind of embarrasingly, really. They knew which building it was in for ages, but it took them years to figure out they just had to smash through the big Roman numeral 10 on the floor.

    • Re:Oh neato! (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Will2k_is_here ( 675262 )
      they just had to smash through the big Roman numeral 10 on the floor.

      :)

      Troy had the same problem. Took us centuries to find it too. There's a lot of ancient mysteries yet to be rediscovered.

      • Re:Oh neato! (Score:3, Interesting)

        by nocomment ( 239368 )
        ya like the cuneiform tablet that refers to soddom. Cool stuff.

        As for the library they should have had an offsite backup. Or maybe this is the reason we know that?
        • As for the library they should have had an offsite backup.

          The Romans ruled every piece of the World the "backup" would have been located. So no, a backup wouldn't have mattered. It's like storing Windows backups on another Windows box. They're both going to get wiped sooner or later.
          • If we hadn't lost that thousand years of Civilization, just think of where Moore's law would have taken processor speeds by now!
          • It's not as if the Romans were on some strange bookburning spree. The library was accidental damage from the attack on the city--given the chance, Caeser would have picked up all the goodies as additional loot.
            • "Accidental"?
              This kind of stuff happened many times throughout history. Conquering civ's tried to erase the history of the conquered by destroying it's traces and replacing history to begin with the conquerors.

              It wasn't about burning books, it was about destroying inferior history.

              • Re:Why would that have mattered? (Score:4, Interesting)

                by Skjellifetti ( 561341 ) on Saturday May 15, 2004 @03:55PM (#9163030) Journal
                Except in this case it probably was accidental. Caeser got into a major fight in Alexandria and the docks where much of the library material was stored caught fire. Here [bede.org.uk] is one scholars attempt to uncover who was guilty of destroying the library.

                Although you are right that many conquerers did deliberately destroy the writings of the conquered (e.g. the Spanish in Mesoamerica), I suspect that more often such libraries were destroyed because the conquerers didn't know or care what a library was (e.g. the Mongol destruction of Baghdad's library or, more recently, Rumsfeld's neglect in Baghdad [ccmep.org] -- I wonder what librarian Laura Bush thought about the untidiness [chron.com] of U.S. forces standing by while an ancient library burned?).
        • Jerri Blank: What's that, Mr. Noblett?
          Chuck Noblett, holding a large, clay phalus: This is a piece of exotic artwork I'm making for an exhibition about the lost city of Pompei.
          Jerri: How was it lost?
          Noblett: Nobody knows, Jerri--it was buried under volcanic ash, so all the records were destroyed.

          mmm strangers with candy

    • X (Score:3, Funny)

      by WTFmonkey ( 652603 )
      X marks the spot!

      Hey, someone had to ruin the joke.

    • What, In Soviet Poland they don't watch Indiana Jones [imdb.com] movies?
      • "What, In Soviet Poland they don't watch Indiana Jones movies?"

        They do, but it was translated a little different. The floor kept smacking Indy in the head.
      • In fact Poland is most loyal US ally in Iraq (which is nothing to be especially proud of)

        • Rektrutacja--I think the "Soviet Poland" phrase was not meant seriously, but as a humorous echo of the "Soviet Russia" jokes popularized by Russian emigré Yakov Smirnoff [c2.com]. (The whole premise of Smirnoff's career as a comedian in the USA was more or less undermined when the USSR broke apart.)

        • Re:Poland is not soviet any more (Score:1, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward
          Russia isn't Soviet anymore either, but that won't stop the jokes.
        • As Creosote pointed out, it was as a farcical remark in reference to all of the Soviet Russia remarks that decrease the signal-to-noise ratio in Slashdot.

          The Big X on the floor is a reference to a scene in an Indiana Jones movie that came out in 1989. Poland was still clinging onto the soviet system. (more likely the other way round?) Lech Walesa wasn't elected President of the Republic of Poland until December of 1990.

          I absolutely agree that being a US ally isn't something to be proud of.

          • Why the self-loathing? (Score:1, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward
            I absolutely agree that being a US ally isn't something to be proud of.

            Why? Who is a good nation to be an ally of? France? Oops... looks like they're involved in their latest little genocide matter in Africa [bbc.co.uk]. Hey, what's a few million dead anyway when they're black or jew as long as a Frenchman is making a buck?

            Germany? My friends in Germany worry me with their desire to blame the Holocaust on the Jews [poe-news.com]. These are some deep rooted issues that are beginning to crop up again. This has long been a popular m
      • In Soviet Poland, INDIANA JONES WATCHES YOU! Okay, mod me down. Someone had to do it.

  • wonder where we be with it. (Score:3, Funny)

    by pvt_medic ( 715692 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @04:17PM (#9144316)
    Imagine where our societies would be if it was still around...

    I wonder if these same people could come up with a list of things that we could burn that would actually set us ahead.
    • This might be another one of those Airplanes / Computers discussions. Had Computer ideas been patented the way they were, they would have developed faster, as with the Wright Bros. and other people using their basic idea as a jumpstart to technology.

      So maybe it's more like this:
      The Burning of Alexandria is to the Development of Technology, as licensing is to computing technology.

      *whew* I'd hate to live at a time when machines controled my every move, from who and how I interact with people, to the wo

    • Well, we tried [canadaka.net], but we left the job half done when we couldn't find any good beer.

      Kidding! We love our big lug of a brother to the south. ;)

    • Re:wonder where we be with it. (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      While the burning of the Library of Alexandria set back science for 1000 years, the Catholic church set back science for another1000 years. Since the Library was burned down about 48 B.C.E., its amazing what only 52 years of science has gotten us (makes me wonder which Greek master first wrote the general theory of relativity)!
      • the Catholic church set back science for another 1000 years

        Did you miss /. this [slashdot.org]? Read what a Vatican astronomer [astrobio.net] has to say about that.

    • They have entire academic journals [amazon.com] devoted to it but no one has burned enough appearently, but some have tried.

    • "Great illustrated classics" Burn them all. They got the names of great classics, but they are simplified versions that ruin the whole point. Read the real book, or sit in your cave ignorant, either one is better than something from that series. I'm glad I had already read real versions before I started adding them to my library (hey they are cheap, and I didn't have them...) or I might not have recognized it.

  • backups! (Score:4, Funny)

    by orn ( 34773 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @04:23PM (#9144383)
    It's said by some that the burning of the library set civilization back as much as a thousand years.

    Which just goes to show the importance of doing your back-ups!

  • More on the Mouseion (Score:4, Informative)

    by DrSkwid ( 118965 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @04:30PM (#9144472) Journal
    Carl Sagan did some work on the
    ancient Library of Alexandria, the Mouseion [dotgeek.org], for his TV series Cosmos.

  • Overheard in ancient Alexandria... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Spoing ( 152917 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @04:38PM (#9144550) Homepage

    1. PHB in toga:
    2. No, Akmed...we can't justify the cost of off-site backups. It's just too expensive!

    Afterwards, PHB got a raise for keeping it "reasonably" under budget. Imagine the loss if both copies were destroyed!!!

  • It's said by some that the burning of the library set civilization back as much as a thousand years
    Who knows? Maybe there was a book in there that might have been as detrimental to civilization as the Bible and by burning it we've been saved.

    • Likely to have been late 4th-century (Score:5, Interesting)

      by waterbear ( 190559 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @06:45PM (#9145965)
      A substantial body of opinion dates the major destruction of the Alexandrian library/museum to the late 4th century AD, i.e. a time when Christians were in charge and very concerned to discourage pagan things, which included the learning of the ancients ........

      It is also worth remembering that much of what did survive out of the destruction of classical learning was eventually preserved and re-transmitted to a deeply ignorant and religiously hidebound Europe several hundred years later through the hands of the relatively liberal and learned muslim arabs ...

      -wb-
      • Yup. This [amazon.com] is a half decent book on the subject I read a few years back. The $64,000,000 question is of course "who burned it down?"

      • A substantial body of opinion dates the major destruction of the Alexandrian library/museum to the late 4th century AD, i.e. a time when Christians were in charge and very concerned to discourage pagan things, which included the learning of the ancients ........

        Your knowledge of history is lax. The Catholic Church (as opposed to, say, the Ethiopian Church) had basically embodied the "science" of a certain group of ancients -- the Greeks.

        By the time Galileo, et al, got around to challenging the Gre

        • Of all of the modern and current libraries that are around, the Vatican Library (yes, the Pope's own book stack) is probabally the most comprehensive collection of medeval and ancient texts that is in existance. For more technical volumes there are other places that are more extensive, but if you are trying to study history or philosophy, this is the place to go.

          To suggest that Christians deliberately burn books simply to hide knowledge is totally wrong. That from time to time bullheaded idiots sometimes get control of ecclesiastical authority and abuse that same political and spiritual power to evil ends is not disputed. This happens in most religions (including atheism) or even political movements. (This is in response to the grandpartent article. I agree with you dasunt.)

          The problem that happened at Alexandria, and what caused the "Dark Ages" was a total breakdown of the political & social framework of Europe due to the collapse of the Roman Empire. It didn't burn down earlier simply because the Roman Legions would have massacred anybody that tried to challenge Roman authority. By 400 A.D. the Roman government had all but stopped existing in any form, and the citizens of Rome itself were fighting off invaders into the city itself from the Vandals, Goths, and other germanic tribes that routinely sacked Rome for what was left of wealth from being an imperial capital. This was almost like the "Mad Max" movies by Mel Gibson in terms of a total lack of control by governments, except in silly irrelavent symbolism that doesn't keep my neighbor from raping my wife and killing my kids.
          • To suggest that Christians deliberately burn books simply to hide knowledge is totally wrong.

            I haven't done any serious research but that much i can point out:

            • They've been burning scientists and their books (inquisition).
            • They've been encouraging destruction of the "savage" culture during the colonisation of the New World.
            • They just can resist burning Harry Potter.
            • If they could just get their hands on they would be happy to burn writings on stem cell research or genetic engineering.

            Having said

            • While I would agree that the church did do some B.S. that I'm not happy with, but it really wasn't all that different than what other political leaders at the same time period also did.

              Often the church was a major political force (England's House of Lords still has member of the clergy holding seats recognising this political authority) throughout Europe during the previous two mellenia. They would even hold territory that would be under the exclusive use of the church (as much as counties or duchies). I
              • One of the incredible things about people coming to America...

                I'll just remind you that in America, and elsewhere, crusaders have been trying to eliminate non-christian cultures (their written works included).

                I'd also like to point out that the modern concept of a University and scientific thought is an outgrowth of Christian thought and philosophies dating from the middle ages.

                You must be a Minister of Information of the Vatican? Secular schooling hint for Europe was given by Arab universities. Giving a

                • I'll just remind you that in America, and elsewhere, crusaders have been trying to eliminate non-christian cultures (their written works included).

                  I think you miss the point. New environments and new experiences forced the idea of religious tolerance to happen in America. If you want to talk about religious intolerance, all you have to do is look at a typical Islamic country right now. In Saudi Arabia and several other countries in that region of the world, it is still the death penalty to convert to

          • This happens in most religions (including atheism)..

            Atheism is the rejection of supernaturalism.

            Name one religion that does not rely on a supernatural mechanism for its existance.

            If atheism is a religion, then an abiotic environment has all kinds of biotic critters running about.

            Atheism is a philosophy, not a theology.

            • Atheism has about as many variants as Christianity... probabally more.

              Perhaps I could use a term a little more appropriate, like Secular-Humanism, which is much more specific in terms of theological viewpoint than simply the concept of somebody who rejects diety or any other sort of supernaturalism. These do indeed have organizations, even aspects that could be called in other context a "sacrament".

              Some atheists I've seen go so far as to form "clubs" of common social groups of this particular viewpoint,
              • Atheism has about as many variants as Christianity... probabally more.

                You obviously haven't visited http://www.adherents.com/.

                Perhaps I could use a term a little more appropriate, like Secular-Humanism...

                Which is not atheism....

                Some atheists I've seen go so far as to form "clubs" of common social groups...

                Which means the chess club is now a religion....

                BTW, I did see a survey of Unitarian ministers that claimed over 65% of the ministers didn't believe in the existance of a God.

                Which doesn't ha

      • Re:Likely to have been late 4th-century (Score:4, Informative)

        by dublin ( 31215 ) on Friday May 14, 2004 @04:05PM (#9156750) Homepage
        It is also worth remembering that much of what did survive out of the destruction of classical learning was eventually preserved and re-transmitted to a deeply ignorant and religiously hidebound Europe several hundred years later through the hands of the relatively liberal and learned muslim arabs...

        Your bigotry is showing.

        There is no doubt that learning was lost after the fall of Rome. Knowledge was preserved through intervening centuries in several unlikely places far afield. Before you blast the Christians for this, perhaps you should know that much of the ancient knowledge that was saved was in fact preserved by the chirch itself. This included much from Arab and other eastern sources that was lost even in the east when the far-from-civilized Mohammedans deliberately destroyed anything they judged heretical, which by definition is pretty much anything other than the Koran and the Hadith.)

        You might want to read How the Irish Saved Civilization [amazon.com] to get an understanding of how the church in Irelend was actually instrumental in maintaining a library of this information through the turbulent times of the incorrectly-named "dark ages", and then re-seeding that information throughout Europe. A good book, worth a read...

    • Detrimental? The Bible? What was detrimental wasn't the Bible, or God; but religious impostors claiming divine authority while doing works of evil. Sure they often claimed the Bible as their source of authority. That doesn't mean that the Bible made them do it. Today, this has put a sour taste in everyones mouth.

      Please don't troll, many of us don't like it.

      The lesson stands: Don't believe or do something just because your ecclesiastical leader tells you to. Read and understand your own religious bo
  • I thought it was destroyed by Omar (Caliph of Baghdad) in 640-someting AD. Julius Caesar would've taken his shot way earlier (47BC) and then by anoher Christian dude.. But if it was destroyed by Omar in 640s it means it was still around to destroy.

    Maybe I'm wrong? Or maybe it's politically correct to blame it on the romans. ;)

    • I thought it was destroyed by Omar (Caliph of Baghdad) in 640-someting AD.

      Omar was not the Caliph of Baghdad, and never even set foot in it. He was Caliph of the Muslims at the time, and Baghdad was not build yet, nor was the seat of power transferred to it yet (this was more than a century after he died. Omar lived in Medina in the western Hijaz region of Arabia. He travelled to Jerusalem to receive the city from the Byzantines though

      Julius Caesar would've taken his shot way earlier (47BC) and the

  • At last! (Score:3, Funny)

    by AtariAmarok ( 451306 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @06:25PM (#9145751)
    At last! They have found it! I have a few overdue books at the place I've been meaning to return. Not looking forward to the fine, though.

  • Other Great Ancient Libraries (Score:4, Interesting)

    by angst_ridden_hipster ( 23104 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @06:26PM (#9145768) Homepage Journal
    There was a great library at Pergamum. It was a competitor to Alexandria, and may have had around 200,000 volumes. Supposedly, the contents of the library at Pergamum were given as a gift to Cleopatra by Mark Antony. I'm not sure where this was chronologically with respect to the destruction of the library at Alexandria.

    Then, even before, there was King Assurbanipal of Assyria, who in 650 BC created a great library. He had copies made of thousands of years worth of Sumerian tablets. In fact, it's unlikely we'd have even a tiny fraction of the surviving Sumerian information if he hadn't done that. His library had 22,000 volumes (clay tablets). I don't know what number of those are still extant and intact.

    That's why I back up all my CDROMs onto clay tablets. As the marketroids tell me, it's a robust archival medium for assuring SOHO data persistence!

  • Address of Alexandria library (Score:5, Funny)

    by rossdee ( 243626 ) on Thursday May 13, 2004 @10:01PM (#9147366)
    A quick google found the library in Alexandria

    Douglas County Public Library
    720 Fillmore St
    Alexandria, MN 56308
    (320) 762-3014

    Thats about 50 miles from where I live.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Except for a few volumes on geometry, the library likely contained masses of CRAP about gods, goddesses, thaumaturgy, alchemy, inaccurate histories, &c.

    Sure, it would be fun and possibly enlightening to read that stuff, but it wouldn't help you cure leprosy. The ancients were IGNORANT, and you should only prize info that has been confirmed by science (something they did not have).

    • Re:We need more burning. (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Except for a few volumes on geometry, the library likely contained masses of CRAP about gods, goddesses, thaumaturgy, alchemy, inaccurate histories, &c.

      You're missing the point. The people who regret the burning argue that all that nonsense being burned just meant that people had to waste hundreds of years thinking it up and writing it all down again again before they could move on to more scientific matters: if the library hadn't been burned, people would have got on with "important" things much soo
  • Why isn't this on the front page? This is by far a lot more important than much of the dribble that gets posted to the front page, and yet it's relegated to just the Science section.

  • Sshh!! (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    "a Polish Egyptian team believes they may have discovered the Library at Alexandria..." wherein they were promptly shushed by the librarian and fined millions in late fees.
  • I am a bit disappointed with the article since it doesn't provide much information on how they found the site and what makes them think it is the library. I mean, how can they know it is not the largest stable found so far...? How can an archeological finding be presented without pictures in this day and age?

    Maybe I am too eager, but does anyone know what conference this was presented at and/or if the archeological team has a webpage? I see that Zahi Hawass has a webpage [guardians.net], but, being a "president of Egypt'

  • Awsome discovery (Score:3, Informative)

    by kbahey ( 102895 ) on Friday May 14, 2004 @11:41PM (#9159485) Homepage

    Well, it is my home town. I was born and raised there many moons ago.

    Anyway, to give some perspective and background:

    • Here is a Map of Alexandria [egyptvoyager.com].
    • The Brucheion would be on the promontary that is just east of where "Raml Station" is marked, facing West.
    • Where it says, Qaitbay Fort still stands today, and is said to be on the site of the famous Pharos Lighthouse of Alexandria, one of the seven wonders of the world, and build using the stones from its ruins.
    • Just at the base of the promontary, the new library of Alexandria [bibalex.org] recently opened.
    • The original library was most probably burned during the Roman attack of the city.
    • The story of the Arabs buring the library is inaccurate and discredited by most historians [bede.org.uk].
    • There was another daughter library at Pompey's pillar (which was not built by Pompey by the way). This one survived for 4 more centuries, but was plundered by Christian fanatic mobs. The same mob dragged the philosopher/mathematician/priestess Hypatia [wikipedia.org]
    • Here is another map of underwater artifacts [underwaterdiscovery.org]
    • Yet another older map from 1855 [geographicus.com] depicting the battle of Alexandria on 1801 between the French and the British.
    • Franck Goddio [franckgoddio.org] has done extensive marine archology excavations in the eastern harbor and other places in Egypt (Abu Qir for example). Interesting photos there, including this map [underwaterdiscovery.org] of underwater buildings and artifacts, and an artist view [underwaterdiscovery.org] of the same.

    Egypt is floating on archeology, literally. It is very common to find amphorae and stuff when digging foundations for buildings.

    Oh, and by the way, here are some pictures from the city today, focusing on the electric tramways [geocities.com], two types, narrow carriage for downtown, and a wider one for the eastern parts.

    I miss it!

  • This is a little know fact about the Library of Alexandria. At the time the other great Library was in Pergamum and they competed for the top spot.

    The Ptolemic Pharaoh stopped the export of parpyrus for a period to try to gain the upper hand. This embargo resulted in pergamom (Origin of word paper)being used as substitute. Pergamom could not easely be concateneted into long roll like Papyrus so they used leafs and later started to bind them into fore-runner of a book.

  • ...at all the "Sputtering rage" going on here. None of you people have any fscking idea what happened to the library, who did it, or how many times it happened.

    But, as usual, it's damn the ignorance, full speed ahead! Especially when it comes to any mention of religion (especially Christan sects) here on ./, the volume goes up and the signal disappears in the noise.

    All we really know about Alexandia is the library is gone and everybody points their finger at their favorite villain.

    I hope you people reali

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