One of the most monumental feats in human evolution was the development of the ability to
share and pass on knowledge. In the modern world, where we are constantly flooded with information,
it is quite easy to take that ability for granted. Although lacking the technological capabilities
and the resources that we have at our disposal today, our ancestors in ancient times were just
as eager to record and secure knowledge. Wise rulers saw the importance of this,
building libraries - places where knowledge can not only be stored but where ideas could
be exchanged. The libraries of Babylon and Nineveh were indeed great, however, they paled
in comparison to the one in Alexandria. Its loss was a catastrophe but one question still remains –
what knowledge did we precisely lose with the destruction of the Great Library of Alexandria?
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The construction of the library was finished in the 3rd century BC, during the reign of Ptolemy
II Philadelphos and it was dubbed the Mouseion – the house of the Muses. A daughter library,
called the Serapion after the Graeco-Egyptian deity Serapis was built during the reign of his
successor, Ptolemy III. Alexandria became the place where scholars gathered from places far
and wide to teach, to learn, to dispute, and to create the greatest library in the ancient world.
The first or one of the first heads of the Mouseion was Ctesibius. A famous inventor
and mathematician, he was fascinated with the science of compressed air,
thereby earning himself the nickname “the father of pneumatics”. According to Vitruvius,
specific clocks built by Ctesibius could activate mechanisms at preset times.
For example, it is mentioned that during a lavish parade organized by Ptolemy II,
a statue of Nysa would stand up by itself, pour libations of milk and sit back down again.
None of his written works survive to this day, although some of them did survive for
long enough to be referenced by others. His most notable invention is the hydraulis,
a form of the pipe organ which is considered to be the predecessor of the modern church organ.
At its apex, the Library of Alexandria housed a gargantuan amount of texts, with numbers ranging
from 40000 to half a million works of various origin and content. One which would have helped
immensely with the approximation of that number are the Pinakes, a monumental bibliographic
catalog. Not merely a list of books, the Pinakes provided biographical information on authors,
evaluations of authenticity along with other information that would be of use to librarians.
Unfortunately, Calimmachus’ library catalog is one of the texts from the library that were lost.
As significant as they were, the Pinakes were far from the most useful or extravagant texts
that were lost. Eratosthenes, who was the head librarian in Alexandria, accomplished one of the
greatest feats of ancient times. He deduced that Earth was round and calculated its circumference.
With all of the resources that his position warranted, Eratosthenes concluded that Alexandria
and Syene were located on the same meridian. By measuring the distance between the two cities,
he determined that the circumference of our planet equaled 252000 stadia.
Modern estimates equate a stadium to somewhere in between 155 and 160 meters.
Accordingly, by Eratosthenes’ calculations, the circumference of Earth was betwixt 39060km
and 40320km – two numbers staggeringly close to the actual 40075km. In the 2nd century AD,
both Claudius Ptolemy and Marinus of Tyre reference Eratosthenes’ work,
however, by late antiquity, it would become unavailable.
It is evident that mathematics was at an enviable level in ancient times. This was
confirmed by the recent discovery that ancient scientists had knowledge of combinatorics,
a field of mathematics believed to be relatively modern. In his dialogues, Plutarch remarked
“Chrysippus said that the number of intertwinings obtainable from ten simple statements is over one
million. Hipparchus contradicted him, showing that affirmatively there are 103049 intertwinings”.
It was only in 1994 that it was discovered that the latter number was in fact the tenth
Schröder number, which is the number of ways in which a sequence of 10 symbols can be bracketed.
This astounding discovery has shown that mathematical problems of great intricacy were
approached and solved by the time of Hipparchus. Hipparchus, being a famous polymath,
was proficient in many spheres of science. Be that as it may, his most groundbreaking works
are in the field of astronomy. After his death around 120BC, the study of astronomy
seemingly went through a hiatus until the times of Seneca in the 1st century AD.
In one of his texts, Seneca states that heavenly bodies are in a constant forward motion and that
what appears as retrogression, is in fact nothing more than a mirage. Additionally, his statements
that planetary stasis and retrogression are merely an illusion and that heavenly bodies
constantly move forward imply that their true motion is not the motion relative to Earth.
Although the exact source for this is not known, it is widely believed that it could have been one
of Hipparchus’ works, or at least that the information was known to Hipparchus also.
Considering the fact that Hipparchus calculated a heliocentric system,
even though he wasn’t a proponent of it, he might have been the source.
One ancient polymath who was actually a proponent of the heliocentric system
was Hipparchus’ contemporary, Seleucus of Seleucia. Strabo mentions that Seleucus studied
and explained the tides by using the lunisolar theory. In his book “The forgotten revolution”,
Lucio Russo mentions that Seleucus’ explanations for the tides may have led him to the hypothesis
that the revolution of the moon around the earth is in fact a circular motion of both bodies
around a common center. It is also known that he was among the first to consider
the universe to be infinite. Unfortunately, none of his writings have survived either.
Euclid of Alexandria is considered to be one of the greatest mathematicians of
all times and his Elements remains one of the most published books to this day.
With such a legacy that he had left behind, it is inconceivable how much of his research
was actually lost. Certain sources claim that as much as half of his works did not survive, most
notably the ones regarding conics and mechanics. Another field of ancient science that was
lost with the Library of Alexandria is optics. Euclid’s studies on optics have indeed survived,
however, they represent a very early stage of research on the subject. Meanwhile,
Claudius Ptolemy’s later writings are considered to be an incomplete recovery of earlier research.
Certain writings imply that a theory of binocular vision had been developed by Hipparchus,
almost 2 millennia before Galileo and Hans Lippershey developed their own telescopes.
Medicine had also suffered from the loss of the Mouseion and would not reach the same levels
until more than 1000 years later. One notable physician from ancient times is Herophilus,
a man considered to be the father of anatomy. None of his works survive, though they are referenced
by later physicians. He is also most likely the first recorded person to have dissected cadavers.
During his career, Herophilus thoroughly researched the cardiovascular, nervous,
gastrointestinal, and reproductive systems. In his work “Midwifery”, he described in detail
the female reproductive system and the processes of procreation and pregnancy.
One of the aims of the book was to demystify the female reproductive system,
in order to make childbirth and the treatment of illnesses significantly simpler. Furthermore,
Herophilos took an active interest in mental health, dream theory, and healthy lifestyles.
Perhaps the most devastating loss in regards to science was the loss of the scientific method.
Few scientists after the Hellenistic period relied on a combination of theoretical and
experimental knowledge. It is not unrealistic that experiments were deemed unnecessary due
to the presence of reliable sources at the time. With the disappearance of those sources
from the Hellenistic period, scientists were unable to repeat any significant research.
Moving away from the realm of science, it is clear that countless works on the topic of history
perished with the library. For example, there are mentions of several texts by Callisthenes,
the man who accompanied Alexander the Great on his campaigns. These include a history
of Greece in between the Corinthian war of 395-387 BC and the Phocian war of 356-346 BC,
as well as a History of the Phocian war. From lesser-known authors,
Agatharcides’ Affairs in Europe, Affairs in Asia, and On the Erythraean Sea are worth mentioning.
One book from On the Erythraean Sea survived and it was praised and referenced by future writers.
If we were to assume that the quality of the lost texts were on par with that of
the extant book, it is a possibility that they contained significant information.
One particularly interesting text which was lost during the decline of the Library is Pytheas of
Massalia’s On the Ocean. Everything that is known of his voyage is known only from the writings of
other authors. Due to the fact that his accounts were some of the only sources of information
about the British Isles, Northern Europe, and the Baltic Sea for a prolonged period of time,
they would have provided useful information in later centuries.
In terms of philosophy, the most notable mentions would be texts by the first generation of
Sophists – Protagoras, Prodicus, and Gorgias. Despite the fact that they were criticized by
future philosophers, it is undeniable that their writings were significant.
Protagoras is mentioned to be an open proponent of agnosticism,
something which was extremely rare and frowned upon in those times. According to ancient sources,
his books were burned in public but are thought to have survived for a few more centuries,
with several copies likely being in Alexandria. The biographer Diogenes Laertius mentions many
of his works, however, the two most important and controversial ones – Truth and On the Gods,
are missing. This correlates with the timeline of the decline of the Mouseion.
Besides the Sophists, we must also mention the Stoic school of philosophy.
Chrysippus who lived in the 3rd century BC, was one of the main Stoic philosophers, composing over
160 texts. Only fragments of his works survive to this day. It is believed that the Stoic school
became as prominent as it did in later centuries due to his excellent defense of their doctrines.
Later Stoics, such as Marcus Aurelius, Seneca, and Epictetus principally place their focus on ethics,
neglecting to write about the foundations of the Stoic principles.
Disregarding philosophy, it would have been interesting to read Chrysippus’ texts, as he had
such a great sense of humor that he apparently died from laughing at one of his own jokes.
Countless old Greek works of prose and poetry were also lost. The Titanomachy, also known as
the War of the Titans, offers diverging accounts of several mythological events from the famous
Hesiodic Theogony. The Thebaid and Epigoni, which tell the story of the war between the sons of
Oedipus and Sophocles’ tragedy, named after the latter did not survive either. The Little Iliad,
the Sack of Troy, and Returns are only some poems from the Epic Cycle that told the entire story of
the Trojan War. There is a legend that says that Ptolemy III tried to purchase original
texts by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides from Athens, only to be refused. In the end, he managed
to convince the Athenians to temporarily send them to Alexandria for copying purposes in exchange
for a large amount of gold. As expected, the Athenians would not see the original manuscripts
ever again. If the legend is, in fact, true then those works are likely to have been lost.
For a long time, the popular belief that the Library of Alexandria met its demise in one
single cataclysmic event was widespread. The truth is not as simple. When the Ptolemaic
Kingdom started to lose its power and prestige, the Mouseion followed suit. Frequent civil wars,
uprisings, and mismanagement from the middle of the 2nd century BC meant that the library could
no longer count on the same favorable policies and resources as earlier. During Julius Caesar’s
Egyptian campaign of 48 – 47 BC Alexandria was besieged and a fire broke out, spreading
to the library. Sources differ when it comes to the extent of the damage, with claims ranging
from complete destruction to only minor damage. Whichever the case may be, the Library continued
to function. After coming under Roman rule, the Library began its slow decline.
By the 3rd century AD, it was merely a shadow of its former self. Whatever remained of the
Great Library of Alexandria was destroyed during the Crisis of the Third Century.
The daughter library, the Serapium, survived until 391 when it was destroyed by Christians.
The loss of the Library is without a doubt a tragedy for humanity but thankfully,
many important texts were disseminated to other libraries in the Mediterranean over the years.
Today, with newer technology at our disposal, it is easy to assume that all of our knowledge is
secure. It is for that very reason that we should not forget that it was not a fire or an angry,
zealous mob that destroyed the Library, but the ignorant belief that knowledge is unnecessary
and costly and that the past is inconvenient and obsolete. The knowledge lost was great,
however, it was nowhere nearly as immense as it is believed. On the other hand, the amount of
knowledge created, collected and shared by the Great Library of Alexandria is incalculable.
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