•I 
DIOCLESIAN'S PILLAR. 463 
was founded by Ptolemy Philadelphus, was called the Serapean, 
and formed a part of that edifice ; that this library, when destroyed 
by the orders of the Calif Omar, was near to the column of the pil- 
lars, and that this column of the pillars was no other than the 
column formerly designated Pompey's, but now known to have been 
erected in honour of Dioclesian. 
The extent of the ruins justifies us in believing the accounts which 
Rufinus and Ammianus Marcellinus have given of the splendor of 
the Serapeum. The elevation on which the pillar stands is not 
natural, but raised on arches, now filled with earth and rubbish, 
but altogether so hard, that I laboured in vain, with Arab workmen, 
and their imperfect instruments, to penetrate to any depth. Here 
might well have been the one hundred steps which led to the tem- 
ple of the deity, and in front of which, in all probability, the column 
reared its head in unrivalled splendor, long before it was dedicated 
to a Roman emperor by a servile governor of Egypt. The temple 
was destroyed by Theodosius in the year 389, but the palaces and 
other buildings which were contiguous, still remained in the time 
of Edrisi, who, in 1153, speaks of a palace situated in the south- 
ern part of Alexandria, which was of an oblong square shape, 
having sixteen pillars at each end, and sixty-seven on the sides, the 
columns of which were still remaining, and at a northern angle, one 
of much greater magnitude than the others, which had a capital and 
pediments. This noble building, for whatever purpose it may have 
been destined, whether for the residence of the priests, or for the re- 
ception of the second library of Alexandria, augmented by the gifts 
of Antony to Cleopatra, at present can only be traced by the found- 
ations or rather the rubbish of bricks and pottery which covers 
