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Canopus, Egypt

This article is about the ancient city and ruins. For the present Egyptian town, seeAbu Qir.For other uses, seeCanopus (disambiguation).

Canopus(Arabic:كانوبKanubu,Coptic:Ⲕⲁⲛⲱⲡⲟⲥ,Kanopos;Ancient Greek:Κάνωπος,Kanōpos), also known asCanobus(Ancient Greek:Κάνωβος,Kanōbos),[1]was anancient Egyptiancoastal town, located in theNile Delta.Its site is in the eastern outskirts of modern-dayAlexandria,around 25 kilometers (16 mi) from the center of that city. Canopus was located on the western bank at the mouth of the westernmost branch of the Delta – known as the Canopic or Heracleotic branch. It belonged to the seventh EgyptianNome,known asMenelaites,and later asCanopites,after it. It was the principal port in Egypt for Greek trade before the foundation of Alexandria, along withNaucratisandHeracleion.Its ruins lie near the present Egyptian town ofAbu Qir.

Canopus
ⲕⲁⲛⲱⲡⲟⲥ
Canopus, Egypt is located in Egypt
Canopus, Egypt
Shown within Egypt
Alternative nameⲕⲁⲛⲱⲡⲟⲥ
LocationAlexandria Governorate,Egypt
RegionLower Egypt

Land in the area of Canopus was subject to rising sea levels, earthquakes, tsunamis, and large parts of it seem to have succumbed to liquefaction sometime at the end of the 2nd century BC. The eastern suburbs of Canopus collapsed,[2]their remains being today submerged in the sea, with the western suburbs being buried beneath the modern coastal city ofAbu Qir.

Name

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p
g		wAtit
niwt
pgwꜣt — Canopus
(Decree of Canopus)[3]
inhieroglyphs
Era:Ptolemaic dynasty
(305–30 BC)
p
n		gwAtiiZ1t
niwt
pngwꜣt — Canopus
(Decree of Canopus)[4]
inhieroglyphs
Era:Ptolemaic dynasty
(305–30 BC)
p
r		gwAtiiZ1t
niwt
prgwꜣt — Canopus
(Decree of Canopus)[4]
inhieroglyphs
Era:Ptolemaic dynasty
(305–30 BC)
g
nw		pt
niwt
Genp — Canopus[5]
inhieroglyphs
gAWt
y		niwt
gꜣwtj — Canopus[6]
inhieroglyphs

The settlement'sEgyptianname was written inDemoticas(pr-gwṱ,sometimes romanized Peguat or Pikuat).[7][8]The Greeks called it Canopus (Κάνωπος,Kánōpos) after alegendary commanderof the era of theTrojan Warsupposedly buried there. The English form of the name derives from theLatinizedform used underRoman rule.

History

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Ancient Egypt

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Canopus was the site of a temple to theEgyptian godSerapis.[1]

The name of Canopus appears in the first half of the 6th century BC in a poem bySolon.[9]EarlyEgyptologicalexcavations some 2 or 3 km from the area known today asAbu Qirhave revealed extensive traces of the city with its quays, and granite monuments with the name ofRamesses II,but they may have been brought in for the adornment of the place at a later date. The exact date of the foundation of Canopus is unknown, butHerodotusrefers to it as an ancient port. Homeric myth claims that it was founded byMenelaus,and named afterCanopus,the pilot of his ship, who died there after being bitten by a serpent.[n 1]Legend describes how Menelaus built a monument to his memory on the shore, around which the town later grew up. There is unlikely to be any connection with "canopy".A temple toOsiriswas built by kingPtolemy III Euergetes,but according to Herodotus, very near to Canopus was an older shrine,[n 2]a temple ofHeraclesthat served as an asylum for fugitive slaves. Osiris was worshipped at Canopus under a peculiar form: that of a vase with a human head. Through an old misunderstanding, the name "canopic jars"was applied by earlyEgyptologiststo the vases with human and animal heads in which the internal organs were placed by the Egyptians after embalming.

The ancient city of Canopus is attested to, in part, by theDecree of Canopus.The decree mentions the temple of Canopus and an important rite in which, once a year, [an effigy of] Osiris is transported fromHeracleiumto Canopus. Specifically, the decree says, "...to consecrate the same goddess like Osiris, in the temple of Canopus,...we shall draw along Osiris during the drawing along of the barge to the same temple, at the season of the year, from the temple which is in Heracleium, on the twenty-ninth of the month of Choac".[10]

Hellenistic period

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InPtolemy III Euergetes' ninth regnal year (239 BC), a great assembly of priests at Canopus passed an honorific decree (the "Decree of Canopus") that,inter alia,conferred various new titles on the king and his consort,Berenice.Three examples of this decree are now known (plus some fragments), inscribed inEgyptian(in bothhieroglyphicanddemotic) and in classicalGreek,and they were second only to the more famousRosetta Stonein providing the key to deciphering the ancient Egyptian language. This was the earliest of the series ofbilingualinscriptions of the "Rosetta Stone Series", also known as thePtolemaic Decrees.There are three such Decrees altogether.[11]

The town had a large trade inhenna.[1]

Roman period

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InRoman times,the town was notorious for its dissoluteness.[1]Senecawrote of the luxury and vice of Canopus, though he also mentioned that "Canopus does not keep any man from living simply".[12]Juvenal'sSatire VIreferred to the "debauchery" that prevailed there.[13]The emperorHadrianbuilt avillaatTivoli,18 miles away from Rome, where he replicated for his enjoyment architectural patterns from all parts of theRoman Empire.One of these (and the most excavated and studied today) was borrowed from Canopus.[11]

Modern town

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Main article:Abu Qir

The Egyptian town ofAbu Qir( "Father Cyrus" ), honoring two Christian martyrs, is located a few kilometres away from the ruins of Canopus. It is a town (around 1900 with 1000 inhabitants), at the end of a little peninsula north-east of Alexandria. It has a trade inquails,which are caught in nets hung along the shore. Off Aboukir on 1 August 1798, the French Mediterranean fleet was destroyed within the roads by British AdmiralHoratio Nelson.On 25 July 1799,Napoleon Bonapartedestroyed there a Turkish army 18,000 strong; and on 8 March 1801, the French garrison of 1,800 menwas defeatedby 20,000 English and Ottoman Turks commanded byAbercromby.[11]

See of Canopus

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Egypt had many martyrs in theDiocletianic Persecution,among others St.Athanasiawith her three daughters, and St.Cyrus and John.There was here a monastery called Metanoia, founded by monks fromTabennisi,where many apatriarch of Alexandriatook shelter during the religious quarrels of the 5th century. Three kilometres (2 mi) east of Canopus was the famous Pharaonic temple of Manouthin, afterwards destroyed by monks, and a church on the same spot dedicated to theFour Evangelists.St.Cyril of Alexandriasolemnly transported the relics of the holy martyrs Cyrus and John into the church, which became an important place ofpilgrimage.It was here that St.Sophronius of Jerusalemwas healed of anophthalmythat had been declared incurable by the physicians (610–619), whereupon he wrote thepanegyricof the two saints with a compilation of seventy miracles worked in their sanctuary (Migne,Patrologia Graeca,LXXXVII, 3379–676) Canopus formed, with Menelaus and Schedia, asuffraganseesubject to Alexandria in theRoman provinceofAegyptus Prima;it is usually calledSchediain theNotitiae episcopatuum.Twotitularsare mentioned byLequien(II, 415), one in 325, the other in 362.[8]

Archaeology

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Ptolemaiccoins from the submerged Heracleion

Over time the land around Canopus was weakened by a combination of earthquakes, tsunamis and rising sea levels.[14]The eastern suburbs succumbed to liquefaction of the soil.[2]The western suburbs eventually became the present day Egyptian coastal city ofAbu Qir.[14]

In 1933, aRAFcommander who was flying overAbu Qir Baythought he was seeing ruins in the bay and informed Egyptian scholarPrince Omar Toussoun[15]who subsequently undertook archaeological investigations and with the help of fishermen found an archeological site 1,8 km from shore.[16]

Since 1992, theIEASMled by Frenchunderwater archaeologistFranck Goddiohas been surveying the Abu Qir Bay.[17][18]The undersea ruins were eventually identified as the lost city of Canopus after excavations.[19]

Underwater archaeologyat the eastern portion of Canopus, 16 mi (26 km) northeast of Alexandria in Abu Qir Bay, has provided numerous important discoveries including the following:

  • A portion of a human-sizedsphinx[14]: 5:38 
  • The head of a four-to-five-meter-tall marble statue of the godSerapis[14]: 8:06 
  • A three-meter-wide, 103-meter-long masonry wall of a major building, almost certainly the Temple of Serapis, aSerapeum[14]: 7:00 
  • A nearly intact life-sized statue, inblack granite,of aPtolemaicqueen, in a transitional Greek-Egyptian style[14]: 11:18 
  • Remains of the ancient ceremonial canal which linked Heracleium [Heracleion] and Canopus[14]: 23:08 
  • Offerings, in the form of small votive statues, which were tossed into the canal[14]: 17:12 
  • The nearly complete wooden remains of a ceremonial boat, or barge, in sycamore, a wood associated with the god Osiris.[14]: 18:30 The canal and boat are believed to have been used to carry an effigy of Osiris in celebrating the sacredMysteries of Osiris,a foundational ceremony for the ancient Egyptian religion.[14]: 20:00 
  • Parts of a nearly completeNaos of the Decades,[20]an ancient Egyptian stone monument providing a guide to the heavens and a portion of the Egyptian creation myths[14]: 34:35 
  • A imperial-period Roman statue ofNilus,the Nile personified[14]: 24:50 
  • Pagan statues with damage done in 391 CE by order of the Christian EmperorTheodosius I,i.e., acts of iconoclasm[14]: 30:10 
  • Artifacts such as coins and jewelry from the site's Christian era[14]: 40:45 
  • Fractured Christian-era masonry structures providing evidence of a massive earthquake[14]: 40:55 

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^The first reference to Canopus as the helmsman of Menelaus seems to be byHecataeus of Miletus.[citation needed]
  2. ^This may have been a reference to the newly discoveredHeracleion.[citation needed]

References

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  1. ^abcdEB(1878).
  2. ^abShenker, Jack (15 Aug 2016)."Lost cities #6: how Thonis-Heracleion resurfaced after 1,000 years under water".The Guardian.Retrieved11 Feb2018.
  3. ^Gauthier, Henri (1920).Dictionnaire des Noms Géographiques Contenus dans les Textes Hiéroglyphiques Vol. 2.p. 154.
  4. ^abGauthier, Henri (1920).Dictionnaire des Noms Géographiques Contenus dans les Textes Hiéroglyphiques Vol. 2.p. 49.
  5. ^Budge, E. A. Wallis (1920).An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary: With an Index of English Words, King List and Geographical List with Indexes, List of Hieroglyphic Characters, Coptic and Semitic Alphabets, Volume 2.p. 1049.
  6. ^Gauthier, Henri (1928).Dictionnaire des Noms Géographiques Contenus dans les Textes Hiéroglyphiques Vol. 5.p. 211.
  7. ^Erichsen, Wolja (1954).Demotisches Glossar.Copenhagen. p. 576.{{cite book}}:CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  8. ^abCE(1913).
  9. ^PDF fileResearch by Franck Goddio
  10. ^The Decree Of Canopus, In Hieroglyphics And Greek, With Tr., And An Explanation Of The Hieroglyphical Characters, by S. Sharpe, London, 1870, lines 25-26, Google Books,https://books.google /books?id=1dYOAAAAQAAJ&q=canopus
  11. ^abcEB(1911).
  12. ^Seneca."Moral letters to Lucilius/Letter 51 - Wikisource, the free online library".en.wikisource.org.Retrieved2021-09-10.
  13. ^Juvenal, Satires, vi.85
  14. ^abcdefghijklmnoCleopatra's Lost City(video). Smithsonian Channel. 2019. Event occurs at 42:16. seriesSecrets,episode S7 E1.Retrieved2024-05-22.
  15. ^"Prince Omar Toussoun".In Magazine.Archived fromthe originalon 27 June 2018.Retrieved27 June2018.
  16. ^Omar Toussoun, 1934. Les ruines sous-marines de la Baie d'Aboukir. BSRAA
  17. ^"Underwater Archaeological Research in Abu Qir Bay".Franck Goddio Underwater Archaeologist.
  18. ^"Discovering Canopus".Franck Goddio - Underwater Archaeologist.Retrieved2022-11-10.
  19. ^Franck Goddio, The topography and Excavation of Heracleion-Thonis an East Canopus (1996-2006), Oxford, 2007
  20. ^The Naos of the Decades Reconstituted,” Franck Goddio, pp. 181-187, 2014, Zenodo (CERN), https:// academia.edu/111746642/The_Naos_of_the_Decades_Reconstituted?uc-sb-sw=22962063

Attribution:

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31°18′N30°5′E/ 31.300°N 30.083°E/31.300; 30.083

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