1
00:00:01,120 --> 00:00:06,000
According to a medieval legend, the library of 
Alexandria was destroyed on the orders of the

2
00:00:06,000 --> 00:00:13,039
Caliph Omar. There were so many books, the story 
goes, that the only way to dispose of them was to

3
00:00:13,039 --> 00:00:20,879
use them as fuel in the city’s 4,000 bathhouses. 
So into the furnaces they went, day after day,

4
00:00:21,600 --> 00:00:27,840
week after week, the wit and wisdom of a 
thousand years going up in smoke, and bits of

5
00:00:27,839 --> 00:00:35,200
blackened books raining on the weary rooftops of 
Alexandria. It took six months to burn them all.

6
00:00:36,640 --> 00:00:42,560
This never actually happened. Even if the 
Caliph had wanted to destroy Alexandria’s books,

7
00:00:42,560 --> 00:00:49,520
he would have found few to burn. By his time, 
the library had already vanished, and was already

8
00:00:49,520 --> 00:00:56,640
shrouded in mystery. That mystery endures. 
The library’s site has never been discovered,

9
00:00:56,640 --> 00:01:00,799
and is unlikely to ever emerge from 
its concrete tomb beneath the modern

10
00:01:00,799 --> 00:01:07,439
metropolis. Many of the questions that surround 
it can never be answered. But in this video,

11
00:01:07,439 --> 00:01:11,840
I hope to at least contextualize the 
significance of the Library’s loss.

12
00:01:13,359 --> 00:01:20,719
The Library of Alexandria was established 
around 300 BC by Ptolemy I. Ptolemy,

13
00:01:20,719 --> 00:01:25,760
once a companion of Alexander the Great, 
had established himself as king of Egypt,

14
00:01:25,760 --> 00:01:32,160
with the bustling seaside metropolis of 
Alexandria as his capital. By collecting texts

15
00:01:32,159 --> 00:01:36,560
and intellectuals, Ptolemy hoped to 
burnish the reputation of his kingdom

16
00:01:36,560 --> 00:01:41,120
and capital throughout the Greek world. To 
those ends, he offered generous stipends

17
00:01:41,120 --> 00:01:45,439
to any famous scholar who would join his 
court, and began aggressively acquiring books.

18
00:01:46,879 --> 00:01:52,799
Ptolemy’s library was part of Museion, a sort 
of proto-university that stood beside the royal

19
00:01:52,799 --> 00:01:58,399
palace. The Museion seems to have consisted 
of a courtyard surrounded by shady stoas and

20
00:01:58,400 --> 00:02:03,920
lecture halls, and included a dining room 
where the resident scholars took meals. The

21
00:02:03,920 --> 00:02:08,719
storerooms and reading rooms of the library were 
apparently attached to the main Museion complex.

22
00:02:10,159 --> 00:02:13,520
Ptolemy’s son and grandson expanded the library,

23
00:02:13,520 --> 00:02:17,920
sending scholars and agents to scour the 
markets of the Greek world for new purchases.

24
00:02:19,039 --> 00:02:23,599
Their bibliomania was so intense, supposedly, 
that ships arriving in Alexandria were compelled

25
00:02:23,599 --> 00:02:29,759
to surrender all books on board for copying. The 
library soon swelled to gargantuan proportions.

26
00:02:30,800 --> 00:02:37,600
Some ancient authors claimed that it contained 
700,000 books – books, in this context, meaning

27
00:02:37,599 --> 00:02:43,280
papyrus scrolls. We don’t know the actual number, 
but it’s generally assumed that it was far lower.

28
00:02:44,240 --> 00:02:47,840
Those inclined to minimize 
the size of the library,

29
00:02:47,840 --> 00:02:54,560
however, should keep in mind that some ancient 
scholars were extremely prolific. For example,

30
00:02:54,560 --> 00:03:00,240
the Alexandrian scholar Didymus, nicknamed 
“bronze-guts” for his inhuman work ethic,

31
00:03:00,240 --> 00:03:04,400
reportedly produced nearly 4,000 
books over the course of his lifetime.

32
00:03:05,759 --> 00:03:10,399
The scholars who worked in the library under the 
early Ptolemies became famous throughout the Greek

33
00:03:10,400 --> 00:03:16,719
world. It was here that the circumference of the 
Earth was first calculated, that the standard

34
00:03:16,719 --> 00:03:22,719
texts of the Homeric poems were established, and – 
appropriately – that the first library catalog was

35
00:03:22,719 --> 00:03:29,759
devised. Like tenured academics in every era, the 
scholars of the library also spent a great deal of

36
00:03:29,759 --> 00:03:35,199
time and energy attacking one another over points 
of pedantry, a habit that earned the Museion

37
00:03:35,199 --> 00:03:41,439
the nickname “birdcage of the Muses.”
The great library declined under the later

38
00:03:41,439 --> 00:03:48,240
Ptolemies, who had less money and less inclination 
to spend that money on squabbling scholars. But it

39
00:03:48,240 --> 00:03:54,640
was in 48 BC, and at the hands of Julius Caesar, 
that the library suffered its first disaster.

40
00:03:55,599 --> 00:04:01,039
Caesar, fresh from his victory over Pompey, had 
become involved in a civil war that pitted the

41
00:04:01,039 --> 00:04:06,879
famous Cleopatra against her brother, Ptolemy 
XIII. When Ptolemy’s forces tried to seize a

42
00:04:06,879 --> 00:04:13,840
fleet moored Alexandria’s harbor, Caesar ordered 
the ships burnt to keep them out of enemy hands.

43
00:04:14,560 --> 00:04:19,040
Unfortunately, the fire spread from the 
docks to the adjacent palace quarter.

44
00:04:19,839 --> 00:04:23,279
According to some ancient authors, 
the flames destroyed the library.

45
00:04:24,240 --> 00:04:27,840
Others authors claim that only a 
portion of the collection was destroyed.

46
00:04:28,800 --> 00:04:33,840
It’s sometimes theorized that the books destroyed 
were not in the main library, but in harbor

47
00:04:33,839 --> 00:04:40,399
warehouses. It seems most likely, however, that 
at least part of the library really was destroyed.

48
00:04:41,439 --> 00:04:47,759
Only a few years later, Mark Antony is said to 
have given Cleopatra 200,000 books from Pergamum.

49
00:04:48,639 --> 00:04:54,000
A gift of this magnitude would only make sense 
if the Alexandria library had been depleted.

50
00:04:55,199 --> 00:04:58,479
The Library continued to operate 
during the Roman imperial era.

51
00:04:59,279 --> 00:05:04,319
Though no longer a hotbed of original research, 
it seems to have remained accessible to scholars,

52
00:05:04,319 --> 00:05:09,199
and was apparently subsidized by the Roman 
administration. During the third and fourth

53
00:05:09,199 --> 00:05:17,039
centuries AD, however, Alexandria experienced a 
massacre, an invasion, a civil war, and a tsunami,

54
00:05:17,040 --> 00:05:22,319
any or all of which might have destroyed the 
library. By the end of the fourth century,

55
00:05:22,319 --> 00:05:27,839
if not sooner, the palace quarter, in which the 
main library was located, was mostly abandoned.

56
00:05:29,199 --> 00:05:33,839
Ptolemy II had established a branch of 
the library, accessible to the public,

57
00:05:33,839 --> 00:05:41,519
in the marble porticoes surrounding the Temple of 
Serapis. But in 391, amidst savage street warfare

58
00:05:41,519 --> 00:05:48,319
between Christian and pagan mobs, the temple was 
demolished. The stoas that sheltered the library

59
00:05:48,319 --> 00:05:54,000
were not destroyed, and would in fact survive 
until the Middle Ages. But since we hear nothing

60
00:05:54,000 --> 00:05:58,399
more about the books, it’s often assumed that 
they were damaged or dispersed at this time.

61
00:05:59,759 --> 00:06:04,079
We don’t know, in short, exactly when the great 
library in the palace and the branch library in

62
00:06:04,079 --> 00:06:10,879
the Serapeum were destroyed. But there 
is no clear evidence for large libraries

63
00:06:10,879 --> 00:06:16,480
after the fourth century; and by the time of 
the Arab Conquest, the library of Alexandria

64
00:06:16,480 --> 00:06:21,600
was probably no more than a distant memory. 
Disasters must have destroyed many of the books.

65
00:06:22,560 --> 00:06:29,280
But the greatest culprit was probably simple 
decay. The library of Alexandria was dependent on

66
00:06:29,279 --> 00:06:32,165
sustained elite patronage and investment – first 
from the Ptolemies, and eventually, it seems,

67
00:06:32,165 --> 00:06:35,519
from the Roman administration. When this patronage 
dried up, and when the texts ceased to be cared

68
00:06:35,519 --> 00:06:41,519
for and recopied, the scrolls of the library 
simply rotted away in Alexandria’s humid air.

69
00:06:46,346 --> 00:07:17,839
So: how much was lost with the Library of 
Alexandria, and how significant were these losses?

70
00:07:18,959 --> 00:07:22,639
At the risk of making an obvious 
point, the Library of Alexandria

71
00:07:22,639 --> 00:07:29,839
was not the only library in the classical world. 
There were hundreds of others, some very large.

72
00:07:30,959 --> 00:07:36,879
Only the most obscure works in the Library of 
Alexandria were not represented by other copies

73
00:07:36,879 --> 00:07:43,199
elsewhere. It’s only because the Library of 
Alexandria’s decline was symptomatic of the

74
00:07:43,199 --> 00:07:49,759
broader decline of classical culture – because, 
in other words, all the ancient world’s libraries

75
00:07:49,759 --> 00:07:54,319
fell into decay at the same time – that 
so many works were lost in late antiquity.

76
00:07:55,519 --> 00:08:01,039
It’s sometimes said that the destruction of 
the Library of Alexandria set civilization back

77
00:08:01,040 --> 00:08:08,800
by centuries. This is a wild exaggeration. The 
scrolls in the library did not contain the bases,

78
00:08:08,800 --> 00:08:15,040
as is sometimes claimed, for great advances in 
science and technology. Although there certainly

79
00:08:15,040 --> 00:08:19,920
many works of mathematics and physics in 
the library, the most important of these

80
00:08:19,920 --> 00:08:25,360
were widely disseminated elsewhere. 
What perished with the library were,

81
00:08:25,360 --> 00:08:31,439
overwhelmingly, lesser-known works of literature 
and philosophy, commentaries and monographs,

82
00:08:31,439 --> 00:08:35,840
all the residue and introspection of an 
extremely sophisticated literary culture.

83
00:08:36,960 --> 00:08:42,000
These works would be a treasure beyond price 
for scholars of the classics, but they were

84
00:08:42,000 --> 00:08:43,900
not the stuff of a foreclosed modernity.
Before we close, I’d like to talk briefly

85
00:08:43,900 --> 00:08:44,001
about this video’s sponsor, Blinkist. Blinkist is 
an app that provides text and audio summaries of

86
00:08:44,001 --> 00:08:44,359
thousands of nonfiction books. If you’re 
interested in learning more on the go,

87
00:08:44,360 --> 00:08:44,447
check out the link in the description. The 
first 100 people to click will get free and

88
00:08:44,447 --> 00:08:46,320
unlimited access to Blinkist for a week, and a 
discount if they choose to buy a subscription.

89
00:08:46,320 --> 00:08:50,480
If you enjoyed this video, please consider 
supporting toldinstone on Patreon.

90
00:08:51,440 --> 00:08:56,160
Every donation helps me to continue making 
carefully researched videos about ancient

91
00:08:56,159 --> 00:09:02,639
history. You might also be interested in my book, 
Naked Statues, Fat Gladiators, and War Elephants.

92
00:09:04,080 --> 00:09:07,840
Thanks for watching.