feet long, supported by several rows of marble pillars: without
the Canopic gate was a spacious circus for the chariot races:
and beyond this the suburb of Nicopolis stretched along the
shore, forming almost a second city, where was a superb amphitheatre,
with a raceground, for the celebration of the quinquen-
nalia.
A considerable portion of the city was occupied by the palace,
within the precincts of which were the museum; accommodations
for men of learning, in which fourteen thousand scholars at a
time were lodged and maintained at the public expense; and a
temple, where the body of Alexander was deposited in a golden
coffin. This was violated by the infamous Seleucus Cibyofactes,
whose avarice tempted him to remove the coffin of gold, and substitute
in it’s stead one of glass.
In the suburb of Rhacotis was a temple called the Serapeum,
built in honour of Serapis, whose image was brought from Pontus
to Alexandria in the reign of Ptolemy Soter. This structure,
according to Ammianus Marcellinus, surpassed in beauty and
magnificence all others in the world, except the Capitol at Rome.
When the museum in the palace was filled with books, to the
amount of four hundred thousand volumes, an additional library
was built within the verge of this temple, which came at length
to contain three hundred thousand more. The library in the
palace was burnt in the war that Julius Caesar waged against the
egyptians: but Cleopatra having added two hundred thousand
volumes from the pergamean library, given her by Mark Antony,
to that in the Serapeum, and others from time to time increasing