Serapeum Alexandriae
About
Great Greco-Egyptian temple to Serapis built under Ptolemy III Euergetes (r. 246-222 BCE), housing a 'daughter library' subordinate to the main Mouseion collection. Sited on Alexandria's only natural hill, in the Rhakotis quarter. Standing and functioning at 117 CE; it was later destroyed by a Christian mob in 391 CE under Theophilus of Alexandria -- well after this snapshot.
What happened here
The building itself is a house for the god, and most people never go inside. Everything public happens on the steps and at the altar in front: an animal led up, examined, killed cleanly, its organs read, the meat divided and eaten. The priest covers his head and a flute player keeps up a noise so no ill-omened word is heard. Worshippers leave what they can afford — a terracotta figure, a coin, a model of the body part they want healed — and the accumulated clutter is periodically cleared and buried on site. On festival days the doors are opened and the cult statue is dressed, garlanded, and sometimes carried out through the streets. The temple also holds money, which is why towns keep their treasury in one.
In ancient writing
- Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae 22.16.12
Ranks the Serapeum second in the world only to the Capitol at Rome, for its colonnades, its statues and its halls.
Sources
Roman Maps shows the empire frozen at 11 August 117 CE, the day Trajan died — its moment of greatest territorial extent. Explore the full map →