Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-03-15
PTOLEMY FOUNDED
LITERARY CENTER
Alexandria Made Famous BY
Patronage of Which Athens
Was Deprived.
BY RALsH V. ID. MAGOFFIN,
Hh.D., LID,

Professor and Head. Department OF
Classics, New York University.
Our post Office directory shows that
there are scores of towns in this coun-
try which have the same name. Such
nomenclature might probably have
been expected, but possibly 1t is only
classical inheritance.
Scattered over the Roman world were
scores of JuliaS, CaeSareas, Augustus,
FlaviaS and Hadrianopoli, which by
their names reveal their origin as col
onies or municipalities founded by
Caesar. Augustus, one of the Flavian
emperors. or Hadrian.
In the Hellenistic world Philip and
Alexander the Great of Macedon. Anti
ochus. Seleucus and Ptolemy Philadel-
phias. In particular, AleXander's mete-
oric career can be very easily traced by
the cities which he left that were
named after himself. OF them all Alex
sndria, in Egypt, is easily first in i'm
portance.
Literary Center Established.
Alexandria was founded in 332 B. c..
as a commercial and military center.
Under AleXander's successor, Ptoiemy
Philadelphus, 1t became also the great
est literary center of the ancient world
the transference of literary activity
from Athens to Alexandria by his sud-
den patronage of literature and the
foundation, or enlargement, OF the
AleXandrian library.
Ptolemy's patronage at once brought
many of the best writers and copyistS
TO his library, where they began what
soon came to be the recognized stand
ard editions of the great writers. From
these so-called "Alexandrian editions"
have descended most of the ancient
manuscripts now preserved In our IA
nous libraries.
Ptolemy obtained the tragedies of the
Greek writer's, Aeschylus, Sophocles and
Euripides, in a way which will show
how eager, even how ruthless, he was
in obtaining what he wanted. There
was famine in Athens. Ptolemy re-
fused to let the Athenians have any
of the food he could distribute unless
the editions he wanted were sent to
him. Of course he got them. He sent
the Athenians the grain they needed,
and also paid them Is talents in silver
(about $4,000.
Greek Tragedies Copied.
However, he did not send back the
ORIGINALS of the tragedies. but anthem
ticated copies instead. He is said to
have bought from Neleus the entire
works of Aristotle. Among the trans
lations which Ptolemy had made for
his new library. were the books Of laws
of the Jews, recommended to him by
his librarian, Demetrius of Phalerum.
This translation is the alleged origin
of the work done by 70 rabbis, known
to us as the Septaugint.
OF the many Librarians Of the Alex
andrian library, Callimachus was prob
ably the most notable. In the first
place, he changed the type OF literary
work being done by the scholars at the
museum and library from dramatic to
pastoral themes. Under Callimachus'
administration catalogue was prepared
which filled 100 volumes.
It was this librarian also who coined
the famous phrase "a big book is big
nuisance" and made the existing vol
umes lighter by dividing works into
several rolls. each one being then called
book. 1t was under Canimachus'
new scheme that Homer and HerodotuS.
among others, were divided into books
as we now have them. Callimachus
fication," and our modern schemes are
little more than Celebrations of his.
The number of volumes in the Alex
endrian library was well above SOC. 900.
A great part of 1t was burned accident
ally during an attack in At B. c., made
by street mob on. Julius Caesar, who
had followed Pompey the Great to
Egypt. 1t is likely that the rest of the
library was burned during the invasion
of Aurelian in 272 A. D.. although there
Is a widely known tradition, still held
to be authentic by many scholars, that
the Caliph Omar, In 642 A. D., had
the volumes distributed among the
baths in Alexandria where they were
burned in the heating stoves. There
seems now to be no evidence that can
be adduced to prove that the tradi-
ton is reliable.