book 27.

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ALEXANDRIA: A. D. 296. Siege by Diocletian.

A general revolt of the African provinces of the Roman Empire occurred A. D. 296. The barbarous tribes of Ethiopia and the desert were brought into alliance with the provincials of Egypt, Cyrenaica, Carthage and Mauritania, and the flame of war was universal. Both the emperors of the time, Diocletian and Maximian, were called to the African field. "Diocletian, on his side, opened the campaign in Egypt by the siege of Alexandria, cut off the aqueducts which conveyed the waters of the Nile into every quarter of that immense city, and, rendering his camp impregnable to the sallies of the besieged multitude, he pushed his reiterated attacks with caution and vigor. After a siege of eight months, Alexandria, wasted by the sword and by fire, implored the clemency of the conqueror, but it experienced the full extent of his severity. Many thousands of the citizens perished in a promiscuous slaughter, and there were few obnoxious persons in Egypt who escaped a sentence either of death or at least of exile. The fate of Busiris and of Coptos was still more melancholy than that of Alexandria; those proud cities ... were utterly destroyed."

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 13. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25717_

ALEXANDRIA: A. D. 365. Great Earthquake.

See EARTHQUAKE IN THE ROMAN WORLD: A. D.365.

ALEXANDRIA: A. D. 389. Destruction of the Serapeum.

"After the edicts of Theodosius had severely prohibited the sacrifices of the pagans, they were still tolerated in the city and temple of Serapis. ... The archepiscopal throne of Alexandria was filled by Theophilus, the perpetual enemy of peace and virtue; a bold, bad man, whose hands were alternately polluted with gold and with blood. His pious indignation was excited by the honours of Serapis. ... The votaries of Serapis, whose strength and numbers were much inferior to those of their antagonists, rose in arms [A. D. 389] at the instigation of the philosopher Olympius, who exhorted them to die in the defence of the altars of the gods. These pagan fanatics fortified themselves in the temple, or rather fortress, of Serapis; repelled the besiegers by daring sallies and a resolute defence; and, by the inhuman cruelties which they exercised on their Christian prisoners, obtained the last consolation of despair. The efforts of the prudent magistrate were usefully exerted for the establishment of a truce till the answer of Theodosius should determine the fate of Serapis." The judgment of the emperor condemned the great temple to destruction and it was reduced to a heap of ruins. "The valuable library of Alexandria was pillaged or destroyed; and, near twenty years afterwards, the appearance of the empty shelves excited the regret and indignation of every spectator whose mind was not totally darkened by religious prejudice."

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 28. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25717_

Gibbon's statement as to the destruction of the great library in the Serapeum is called in question by his learned annotator, Dr. Smith.

See above: B. C. 282-246.

ALEXANDRIA: A. D. 413-415. The Patriarch Cyril and his Mobs.

"His voice [that of Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, A. D. 412-444] inflamed or appeased the passions of the multitude: his commands were blindly obeyed by his numerous and fanatic parabolani, familiarized in their daily office with scenes of death; and the præfects of Egypt were awed or provoked by the temporal power of these Christian pontiffs. Ardent in the prosecution of heresy, Cyril auspiciously opened his reign by oppressing the Novatians, the most innocent and harmless of the sectaries. ... The toleration, and even the privileges of the Jews, who had multiplied to the number of 40,000, were secured by the laws of the Cæsars and Ptolemies, and a long prescription of 700 years since the foundation of Alexandria. Without any legal sentence, without any royal mandate, the patriarch, at the dawn of day, led a seditious multitude to the attack of the synagogues. Unarmed and unprepared, the Jews were incapable of resistance; their houses of prayer were levelled with the ground, and the episcopal warrior, after rewarding his troops with the plunder of their goods, expelled from the city the remnant of the misbelieving nation. Perhaps he might plead the insolence of their prosperity, and their deadly hatred of the Christians, whose blood they had recently shed in a malicious or accidental tumult. Such crimes would have deserved the animadversions of the magistrate; but in this promiscuous outrage the innocent were confounded with the guilty."

_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 47. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/25717_

"Before long the adherents of the archbishop were guilty of a more atrocious and unprovoked crime, of the guilt of which a deep suspicion attached to Cyril. All Alexandria respected, honoured, took pride in the celebrated Hypatia. She was a woman of extraordinary learning; in her was centred the lingering knowledge of that Alexandrian Platonism cultivated by Plotinus and his school. Her beauty was equal to her learning; her modesty commended both. ... Hypatia lived in great intimacy with the præfect Orestes; the only charge whispered against her was that she encouraged him in his hostility to the patriarch. ... Some of Cyril's ferocious partisans seized this woman, dragged her from her chariot, and with the most revolting indecency tore her clothes off and then rent her limb from limb."

_H. H. Milman, History of Latin Christianity,