Sights of Alexandria, Egypt

Sights of Alexandria, Egypt | The 10 Best Attractions in Alexandria

Alexandria, a metropolis in Egypt on the Mediterranean coast. In our blog, we'd like to introduce you to Alexandria, a modern, cosmopolitan city with many attractions on the Egyptian Mediterranean. There's so much to discover.

Enjoy reading…

Alexandria is the second largest city in Egypt, located on the Mediterranean coast. It was founded in 331 BC by Alexander the Great. Alexandria lies on the western edge of the Nile Delta, just above sea level, on a narrow strip of land along the Mediterranean Sea. The Egyptian port city of Alexandria boasts the country's largest seaport, handling approximately 80% of Egypt's foreign trade.

The ancient city was especially known for its lighthouse (Pharos), one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and for its large library.

Sights in Alexandria:

Today, Alexandria is the second most visited city in tourism after Cairo and offers a wide variety of attractions.

Pompey's Column

This 27-meter-high freestanding triumphal column is a remnant of the former Temple of Serapis, the Serapeion. It was erected in honor of Emperor Diocletian and not, as was once mistakenly thought, in honor of the general Pompey.

This red granite column is the largest column outside the imperial capitals of Rome and Constantinople, and also the largest ancient structure in Alexandria.

The Pompeius rises on the remains of an ancient wall, a hill covered with architectural fragments and rubble.

The foundation is still visible above ground today and consists of cuboid blocks.

On the topmost block of the foundation is a spolium on which hieroglyphs can be seen; it is striking that the hieroglyphs are upside down, meaning the block was built upside down.

National Museum Alexandria

The National Museum in Alexandria was only reopened at the end of 2003 after a renovation.

The museum is located in a three-story palace belonging to Al-Saad Bassili Pasha. If you begin your visit on the ground floor, you will first encounter underwater artifacts discovered during underwater excavations in Alexandria.

The exhibits are very well presented. Following the tour, you pass many Greco-Roman artifacts and also get a brief overview of the history of Alexandria.

Upstairs you can admire mostly Coptic and Islamic art.

Kait Bey Citadel

It is a fortress located on the Mediterranean coast in Alexandria. The fortress was built as part of the coastal defenses against a growing threat from the Ottomans.

The fortress was built between 1477 and 1479 under the Mamluk Sultan El-Ashraf ed Din Qaitbay on the ruins of the ancient pharaoh's lighthouse. The rubble of the destroyed lighthouse and its foundation were used as building materials. The fortress also served as a prison.

When Muhammad Ali became Egypt's ruler in 1805, he renovated the old fortress and equipped it with modern weapons of the time, especially cannons. In 1882, Alexandria was bombarded by a British fleet, and a large part of the fortress was destroyed.

The castle was designed in the shape of a square with an area of ​​130 meters by 150 meters, a side length of 30 meters and a height of 17 meters, and was built on 3 floors in the same square shape.

On the first floor you can see a mosque, as well as corridors for soldiers. There was a minaret, but it was destroyed.

On the second floor of the Qaitbay Citadel, one finds corridors, private rooms, and meeting rooms. On the third floor, there is a large room containing Sultan Qaitbay's seat, where he would sit to watch the warships make their full day's march to Alexandria. Also on display are equipment and tools used for food preparation, as well as a bakery and a mill. After the 1952 revolution, the building became a naval museum.

The largest restoration was carried out in 1984 at the initiative of the Egyptian Antiquities Organization. Today, the fortress complex houses, among other things, a maritime museum.

Lighthouse of Alexandria

"Pharus of Alexandria"

According to tradition, the Lighthouse of Alexandria was the first lighthouse ever built and, at approximately 115-160 meters, remained the tallest lighthouse ever constructed until the 20th century. It is one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

It is also called the "Pharos of Alexandria" because it stood on the small island of Pharos. Behind the island of Pharos is a bay that forms a natural harbor. Long before the lighthouse was built, this harbor was a popular spot for sailors to take on provisions and water.

Like many other wonders of the ancient world, the lighthouse suffered severe damage from an earthquake in 1330. Around 1480, Sultan Qaitbay built a castle on the lighthouse's foundation, using the collapsed debris as building material.

The lighthouse stood on the island of Pharos, which was connected to the city by a 1.3 kilometer long causeway. It had three stories.

The fire in the tower burned day and night; to keep the light going, fuel was transported to the third floor via an elevator. The light, with the aid of a concave mirror made of polished bronze, shone up to 55 kilometers away.

Today the lighthouse has been renovated and can be visited.

Montaza Palace / Garden

The Montaza Palace is built in the eclectic style; the building was constructed between 1923 and 1928 by Ernesto Verrucci, modeled after the Castello Mackenzie in Genoa. The palace features long open arcades along the seafront.

It served as the summer residence of King Fuad. The Montaza Palace contains lush gardens, the largest of which is 3000 meters wide and includes a vast collection of trees and plants, some of which are rare, and some tropical plants that are still in good condition despite being planted more than 75 years ago.

Upon entering Montaza Palace, you'll see the Hilton Palestine Hotel, the only hotel built within one of the royal palaces. The hotel boasts 233 rooms, all offering stunning views of the sea or the gardens. During World War I, the palace served as a military hospital, where British soldiers were treated.

Alexandria Zoo

The zoo is the second largest in Egypt. The Alexandria Zoo is located in the Nozha district, near the Smouha quarter.

At the zoo you can do many activities, especially observe the animals in the park, the most important of which are lions, tigers, zebras, monkeys and bears, and you can also have the experience of feeding them yourself.

There is a reptile house that includes various species of reptiles from different parts of the Arab Republic of Egypt, such as the Egyptian cobra, tortoises, and the famous Nile crocodile. In addition, the zoo is home to a variety of bird species, small mammals, ducks, geese, and swans. There is also a beautiful garden with a landscaped area and a spectacular rose garden.

Aside from that, the Alexandria Zoo contains some of the landmarks that make it special and which you can visit, the most important being the Antoniadis Palace and the gardens adjacent to the zoo, marble statues with a Greek character, and a natural history museum with taxidermied animals.

Aquarium in Alexandria 

This museum was built in 1930 and is located near the Qaitbay Citadel in Alexandria's eastern harbor. The animals on display range from fish and crustaceans to turtles (both marine and freshwater).

This museum is also the permanent home of the Marine Research Institute. The Aquarium of Alexandria is the only museum of its kind in Alexandria that houses small marine creatures, and it is a small museum that displays various species of fish and creatures from the Mediterranean and the Red Sea.

Princess Fatma Al-Zahra Palace

The palace was built between 1919 and 1923 under Zeinab Fahmy, the princess's mother, according to plans by the architect Antonio Lasciac. The glass bridges with which the building was constructed were manufactured by a Frankfurt company. The rooms of the palace are decorated with paintings of the royal family.

The walls and ceilings are adorned with impressive oil paintings of angels and landscapes. The stained-glass windows are unique in that they depict a scene from a love story, from the first meeting to the wedding.

Mosque of Abu al Abbas el Mursi

The Abu al Abbasi Mosque is not very old, yet it is the most important mosque in Alexandria. It bears the name of a saint from Andalusia, Sidi Abul Abbas el-Mursi, and therefore incorporates many Andalusian architectural elements. Construction of the mosque began in 1928, but it was not completed until 1945.

The mosque's central domed roof is supported by eight columns made of rose granite, which originates from Italy. Women are unfortunately not allowed inside the mosque, but they are permitted to visit the mausoleum.

The original mosque was built in 1306 by a wealthy Alexandrian merchant, next to the tomb of al-Mursi. In 1927, the Ministry of Religious Endowments decided to demolish the old mosque and build a new one.

Catacombs of Kom El Shoqafa 

A historical archaeological site in Alexandria, and is considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Medieval World.

The catacombs were originally built for a single wealthy family. They stand as a monumental testament to how the myths of ancient Egypt survived the centuries of Greco-Roman rule. The catacombs were discovered by chance in 1900 when a donkey cart fell into a pit.

The Great Library of Alexandria

The large library founded by Ptolemy II remains famous to this day. Together with the Museion, it forms part of the museum complex.

(Temple of the Muses) transformed the city of Alexandria into an intellectual center of the ancient world. Over a million scrolls were stored in the library and formed the canon of science at that time.

The fate of the Great Library during Caesar's conquest is disputed. Some ancient sources mention a fire during Caesar's conquest of the city in 48/47 BC. However, as Edward Parsons demonstrates in his source analysis, only six out of sixteen sources about Alexandria from that period support this hypothesis.

The first of these sources was written about 100 years after the alleged incident, and the number of books allegedly lost varies from 40,000 (the first source) to 700,000, i.e., the entire library.

The last source (the church historian Orosius) again mentions 40,000 books. The Museion of Alexandria, to which the library was attached, certainly continued to exist, since several directors of the Museion from post-Christian times are known, and Plutarch writes of a gift of 200,000 scrolls from the Library of Pergamon to Caesar.

The collection of the ancient library was severely damaged several times; the most devastating destruction of the book holdings occurred during fighting in the 3rd century AD, and the last works were probably lost during the Islamization of Egypt. No archaeological evidence of the ancient library has survived.

The idea of ​​rebuilding the library on its historical site was first formulated in the early 1970s by a group of professors of ancient history at the University of Alexandria.

Led by Mostafa El-Abbadi, the scientists succeeded in winning over both the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to the idea in the mid-1980s.

Construction of the new library began in 1995 and was completed in July 2001.

The total construction costs amounted to

218 million US dollars