Alexandria of Egypt

ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT. - A city of Egypt, founded by Alexander the Great in 332 B.C., 14 km west of the branch of the Nile called Canopus, on the shore of the Mediterranean opposite the island of Pharos (which offered the possibility of two excellent harbors).

1. ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT IN SACRED SCRIPTURE

Situated at the point of intersection of Europe with Africa and Asia, A. became, under the far-sighted government of the first Lagids, one of the greatest metropolises of the ancient world. In the realm of the spirit it was the heir of Athens, in the commercial realm the heir of Tyre, Sidon, and Carthage. Of this latter fact a small trace remains to us in the New Testament, where we read that St. Paul was traveling on an Alexandrian ship when he was shipwrecked near Malta (Acts 27:6 ff.); it was also an Alexandrian ship that carried him from Malta to Puteoli (Acts 28:11-13).

The name of A. itself never occurs in the original text of the Bible. The five mentions of A. in the Vulgate (Jer. 46:25; Ezek. 30:14-16; Nah. 3:8) are due to a misunderstanding of St. Jerome, who, believing the city to have been founded on the site of ancient No (Thebes), replaced the name No of the Hebrew text with the name A. (v. AMMON). But the noun "Alexandrian" (ἀλεξανδρεύς) is found twice in Acts: 6:9 (the Alexandrians formed a distinct group in the synagogue of the Hellenistic Jews at Jerusalem) and 18:24: Apollos (v.) was a Jew, an Alexandrian by birth (ἀλεξανδρεύς τῷ γένει). This fleeting mention indicates to us wherein consists the true importance of A. for the Bible.

It was the city where, as in no other place, a very large group of Jews, in the best economic and political conditions, lived in continuous close contact with the new center of the Hellenic world, where around the gigantic library of the Museum, from as early as 111 B.C., an intense activity seethed in every field of knowledge. In A., from its foundation, the number of Jews was very considerable and grew to the point that of the five quarters two were considered and called Jewish. Favored first by the Ptolemies and after the Roman occupation also by the emperors, the Jews lived as an independent and autonomous political community in their internal affairs, faithful to the law and the traditions of the fathers. Nevertheless, the continuous contact with the dominant Hellenistic population was such as to make the mass of the Jews forget, from the very first century of their residence in A., both their sacred language and their spoken language (Aramaic). Greek became the language of daily life, in use also in the synagogue, and from this arose the necessity of translating the Bible into Greek.

This version, called that of the Seventy (v.), bears the unmistakable imprint of a mentality strongly influenced by the Greek philosophical environment. The translators show a tendency to remove, or at least to mitigate, not a few anthropomorphisms of the original text, which offended the sensibility of minds formed in the school of Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Plato, or even in the Stoa. The Greek influence on Alexandrian Judaism penetrates even into the orbit of the very word of God. In II Macc. the word of God clothes itself in all the rhetorical artifices of contemporary historiography. II Macc. is the only work preserved to us in its entirety from Hellenistic-Jewish historiography before Christ. Of other authors we know only the names and some fragment, more or less extensive. The most important are the dry and jejune Demetrius (ca. 210 B.C.), the fanciful Eupolemus (ca. 155), the fantastic Artapanus (ca. 100). More than elsewhere, within the ambit of the Bible, the influence of the Alexandrian environment manifests itself in the book of Wisdom (v.). Although the author remains faithful to the beliefs of his people, the surprising force, which is not found in the Old Testament, with which in the first part of his book he emphasizes the life of the afterlife, will also be due to the Hellenized and Hellenic environment for which he writes. In the second part of the book (chaps. 6-9) the author's Greek erudition is especially manifest. In chap. 7:17-20 the author shows himself open to all the sciences, which were cultivated with such fervor in the metropolis of Hellenism. Divine Wisdom (7:22-8:1) is described with the terms used by the Greeks for the "Noûs" of Anaxagoras, the "Lôgos" of the Stoics, the "soul of the world" of the Platonists, with the evident intention of making it understood by this "polemical parallelism" that the Wisdom of God is the true Noûs, the true Lôgos, the true soul of the world. At the same time the terminology of popular philosophy allowed those terms to be taken in a broader sense, making it possible to prescind from the errors originally associated with them: Platonic dualism and Stoic materialism. In the third part (chaps. 10-19), which shows the work of divine Wisdom in the history of Israel, we have two significant digressions. The first speaks of God as merciful even in punishing the adversaries of his people, and this because they too are "men," a sign that in the Alexandrian Jew the idea of the Creator of all the human race seeks to overcome the barrier of national particularism and to meet with the Hellenistic-Stoic idea of the unity of all men. The second digression is directed against idolatry and constitutes another document of the new mentality that grew up in the intellectual and cultural climate of A. In the polemic against the gods of the philosophers the author investigates the reasons for the errors, recognizes the aesthetic sense of the Greeks, their good will, their search for truth.

However, the Bible not only underwent influences from the Alexandrian environment, but in its turn influenced it and the Hellenistic world. Numerous were the pagans who conformed their lives to the customs of the Jews, and the commemorative feast for the Greek version of the Seventy was celebrated even by the pagans. Just as, therefore, the Alexandrian version, casting new ferment into the idolatrous environment, prepared the way for the Gospel of Christ among the pagans, so too it smoothed the way for Christ even in the hearts of the Jews themselves, to such a degree that in later centuries the translation of the Bible was considered in Judaism a disaster worthy of being commemorated with a day of national mourning.

A great part in this "evangelical preparation" was played by the allegorical interpretation of the Bible, a fruit not new, but typical of the close coexistence between Jews and Greeks in A. From the certainty of having in the Law of Moses the sole source of all religious and ethical truth, and from the surprise of finding in Greek philosophy concepts of high spirituality and of a very elevated morality, was born the desire to show that all the apparent crudenesses in the Bible were pregnant with spiritual truths, and that all the good of Greek philosophy was also found in the Law of Moses, indeed, given the antiquity of this law, that it was the source from which the ancient priests and philosophers drew, especially Plato, the great traveler. The infallible means of demonstrating the identity between Greek philosophy and the Law of Moses was precisely allegorical interpretation. With this method the Greeks too saved their "Bible," Homer, modernizing it and finding in it, allegorically hidden, the most profound ideas of philosophy. Father of the interpretation allegorical interpretation of the Bible in A. is considered to be Aristobulus (v.) around 160 B.C. But the one who in this field summarized and far surpassed all his predecessors was Philo (v.) of A., the contemporary of Jesus. The almost integral preservation of his voluminous work still testifies today to the high esteem in which this most celebrated among the Alexandrian Jews was held by the Christians of the first centuries and especially in that first catechetical school (Pantaenus, Clement, Origen) which became the immediate heir of the Alexandrian Jewish school and of its method of allegorical interpretation of Sacred Scripture.

Max Zerwick

2. THE SCHOOL OF ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT

In a city like A., rich in so many scientific institutions and philosophical schools, it is obvious that the need was also felt to establish a higher school of religion, one that aimed not so much at catechetical exposition as at scientific deepening and at the defense and illustration of religion. According to Philip of Side, Athenagoras would have been its first teacher, but the common opinion attributes its foundation to St. Pantaenus (v.), the ape sicula, around 180. He was succeeded by Clement of Alexandria (v.), the philosopher of the practical rather than the speculative life (from about 200 to 202), then by Origen from 203 to 231, a profound scholar and bold philosopher, a most prolific writer and a powerful speaker, the other great figure of the school. Removed for his bold, scarcely orthodox conceptions, he was succeeded by Heraclas and Dionysius (v.), his disciples, and by others among whom were Pierius, Achillas, Peter the martyr (v.) and especially Didymus the Blind (v.), who for over 50 years attracted an extraordinary number of disciples (among them Rufinus, Jerome, Palladius), admirers of his doctrine and piety. After him Rhodone (v.) still kept the school for a few years, and in the time of Theodosius he transferred it to Side in Pamphylia.

We know little about the organization of the school. There was for the most part a single teacher, and it seems it had no fixed premises. The school was public, the audience free and of every age and condition; thus there could hardly be a determined program, much less a method of teaching. It was in substance a matter of lectures on religious and apologetic subjects. Although the school was under the supervision of the bishop and the teachers were appointed by him, it nevertheless appears that there was also a broad freedom of ideas. The two most celebrated teachers, Origen and Didymus, were laymen. Under the influence of the environment, which was also Jewish (one need only think of Philo), and of the two great first teachers, Clement and Origen, the orientation of the school was twofold: philosophical and scriptural. In philosophy an attempt was made to penetrate as far as possible the Christianity of the eclecticism then dominant with a Neoplatonic background, in order to make it more modern and acceptable to cultivated pagan minds; as for the Bible, its total divine inspiration and inerrancy were always firmly maintained, and therefore, in order to have it accepted as such also by learned pagans, allegorical interpretation was practiced on a vast scale, in the same way that pagan philosophers and lecturers then treated mythology and the Homeric books, even though Origen himself inaugurated biblical studies on a very broad basis of textual criticism, an example that moreover was not followed.

Serious consequences of this philosophical contamination and of unbridled allegorism manifested themselves both in the so-called Origenist errors and in the mystical tendency to deny the fact of the human nature of the Redeemer. Nevertheless, the great spirits who grew up in this school (such as Athanasius, Didymus and Cyril) were able to restrain these tendencies within limits compatible with dogma. Indeed, through the daughter school of Caesarea founded by Origen, the great Cappadocians too can in part be considered a fruit of the Alexandrian school. Through it and in it the first attempts at a theological synthesis were made, and in particular a demonstration was sketched of the agreement of reason with faith beyond the narrow limits within which the apologists properly so called had kept themselves.

Antonio Ferrua

3. HISTORY OF THE PATRIARCHATE OF ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT

What is dealt with here is the Greek patriarchate which, after the Council of Chalcedon (451), came to be designated by the name Melkite (imperial) in opposition to the Monophysite Copts who did not adhere to the Byzantine emperor who favored that Council; today, however, the term Melkite is used for Catholics of the Byzantine or Greek rite and of Arabic language wherever they may be found.

1. From the introduction of Christianity to the Council of Nicaea (325). According to the good testimonies of Eusebius, Epiphanius, St. Jerome, the Church of A. was founded by St. Mark, disciple of St. Peter; Eusebius relates that under the emperor Septimius Severus (193-211) there were numerous martyrs in A. and in the Thebaid, that is, in southern Egypt. Christian communities existed before the Council of Nicaea in 50 nomes (districts) of Egypt including Cyrenaica, and more than 40 episcopal sees are listed. At the Synod of A. of 320 (or 321) about a hundred bishops were present. Christianity had penetrated even into the villages, as we know from the discoveries of papyrology and from later martyrological documents. Egypt must be counted among those countries of the empire in which Christianity was professed by a great part of the population. Cyrenaica, the Pentapolis to the west of Egypt, had given to the Church some of its first faithful (Simon; Lucius; the converts of Pentecost) as is related to us in the Gospels and in the Acts of the Apostles. In the second half of the 3rd century in each of the five cities Cyrene, Ptolemais, Berenice, Arsinoe, Sozusa there was a bishop dependent on the bishop of A. Under the emperor Philip I (244-49) the virgin and martyr Apollonia died in A. If the persecution of Decius in 250, as is certain, has to record apostates in Egypt, there were nevertheless also martyrs, not a few of them soldiers, and others of different ages and social conditions. Other Christian heroes are known from the times of the persecutions of Valerian in 257, of Diocletian in 304, and of Maximinus Daia (310-12). Alongside the martyrs, the Church of A. has the glory of having promoted monasticism (v.), whose principal representatives are Sts. Paul, Pachomius, Antony (d. 365). The vitality of the Church of A. is also shown in the fact that it was able to overcome heretical crises (Gnosticism, Sabellianism, Arianism) and the Meletian schism (Meletius of Lycopolis); to the victory over these errors contributed the Synods of A., the catechetical school and above all excellent bishops such as Dionysius of A., the Great (264-65), Peter the martyr

(300-311), St. Alexander (312-28) and later St. Athanasius.

II. From St. Athanasius (328-73) to the death of St. Cyril of Alexandria (444). The imposing figure of St. Athanasius, the most celebrated of the Alexandrian bishops, is to be counted among the most eminent personalities of Christian antiquity; he is the intrepid defender of the Nicene faith and of ecclesiastical liberty against the imperial power that championed Arianism. He refused to readmit Arius into the Church; for this firmness he was deposed by the Synod of Tyre (335) and exiled, and he began his most troubled life and had to remain away from his flock no fewer than five times (v. ATANASIO). Egyptian writers of the 4th and 5th centuries (down to the Council of Chalcedon) are, besides the great Athanasius, Serapion (after 362), rector of a monastery and then bishop of Thmuis in Lower Egypt, Didymus the Blind, a layman deprived of sight from the age of four, teacher of St. Jerome and Rufinus, Synesius of Cyrene (370 or 375 - 413 or 414), bishop of Ptolemais (around the year 410), Nonnus of Panopolis in the Thebaid, Ammonius of Alexandria, and above all St. Cyril, nephew of the patriarch Theophilus, the adversary of St. John Chrysostom. St. Cyril (v.) too is an imposing figure in ecclesiastical history like St. Athanasius; his activity surpassed the limits of his patriarchate (412-44), especially on account of his struggle against the heresy of Nestorius.

With regard to the ecclesiastical situation of the patriarchate of Alexandria, it is to be noted that at the Council of Nicaea the privileges of Alexandria are confirmed in can. 6, namely the authority of the bishop of Alexandria over Egypt, Libya and the Pentapolis, likewise brought into prominence, without however denying the primacy of the bishop of Rome, in can. 2 of the Council of Constantinople. Nevertheless the rivalry between Alexandria and Constantinople persisted even after this council; Alexandria remained great as a center of culture; the bishops of Egypt could intervene in municipal affairs (appointment of officials, review of finances, maintenance of municipal buildings, etc.). Exceptional circumstances favored the influence of the patriarchs, for example of St. Cyril, in civil and political matters. The honorary title of pope that remained with the patriarchs of Alexandria goes back already to the 3rd century; the title of patriarch is attested at the end of the 4th century; the title of judge of the universe appears for the first time in the 6th century; the assertions of some recent authors who trace it back to the 5th or even the 11th century do not withstand criticism; the title of archbishop is used in the 4th century by St. Athanasius.

III. From the patriarch Dioscorus to the Arab conquest (638). The patriarch Dioscorus (444-51), who sided with Eutyches (Synod of Ephesus, 449, under his presidency) and who was deposed by the Council of Chalcedon (451), was relegated by the emperor Marcian to Gangra (Paphlagonia), where he died in 454. But many Egyptians, unwilling to recognize the dogmatic "tome" of Pope Leo I and the decisions of the Council of Chalcedon, supported by the Byzantine emperor, separated from the Catholic Church out of obstinacy, for political reasons and also in the persuasion of thereby preserving fidelity to the doctrine of St. Cyril, and formed a new Church called Coptic, while they in contempt called the Catholics "Melkites." The first Coptic and Monophysite patriarch was Timothy Aelurus, the second Peter Mongus (v. copti). The Greek patriarchate remained faithful to the Council of Chalcedon. Its history, however, from 452 down to the present, is very poor, because Monophysitism had inflicted a most grievous wound on the Catholic Church and the number of the faithful was very limited. Of the Melkite patriarchs before the Arab invasion, three saints deserve particular mention: Proterius (452-57), Eulogius (580-607), John III the Almsgiver (609-619). Proterius sent his profession of faith to Pope Leo the Great and received comfort from him; he held a synod at A. where he condemned the head of the Monophysite party, then a simple priest, Timothy (the future patriarch), who after the death of the emperor Marcian (457) took the opportune occasion to have himself consecrated bishop by two heretical bishops. A few days after this consecration Proterius, assailed by a hostile crowd, was massacred. Eulogius, a Syrian by birth, ordained priest at Antioch, had known Gregory the Great at Constantinople, then apocrisiarius, and formed a friendship with him. Having received, like an earlier predecessor of his, Apollinaris (551-570), such powers as raised him to the rank of viceroy, he had the Coptic patriarch Damian expelled from Egypt: he preferred, however, to fight the Monophysites with his writings, in which he defended the "Tome" of Leo the Great. To him are due the conversion of some Monophysites and the founding of new Catholic churches. Although in Upper Egypt his influence remained nil, he was able to exercise his salutary influence in the city of A. where the Greeks, officials and notables, predominated. He held a synod at A. in 589 against the Samaritan heretics; in his writings he defended Catholic doctrine also against the Novatians and others. With Gregory the Great he maintained frequent correspondence, as the register of that pontiff's letters shows us. While his immediate successor, Theodore, was assassinated on the occasion of the revolution against the emperor Heraclius, St. John the Almsgiver, who succeeded him, was able to exercise great charity during a severe famine.

Leontius of Neapolis in Cyprus, his friend and compatriot (John was born in Cyprus), wrote a highly esteemed biography of him. When the Persians invaded A., the patriarch, who derived from it none of the advantages granted to the Copts, withdrew around 619 to Cyprus. As the patriarchate of George (620-30), owing to the Persian occupation of Egypt (617-27), cause of the destruction of churches and monasteries, and of the deportation and martyrdom of Christians, was very sad, so was the patriarchate of Cyrus (630-43) unhappy. In this period there occurred the Arab invasion (638); then the new movement of Monothelitism which in the person of Cyrus, protected by his colleague Sergius of Constantinople, seriously threatened to win other figures over to its heresy. At A. two saints, great champions of Catholic orthodoxy, Sophronius and Maximus the Confessor, manfully opposed the baneful doctrines of the patriarch. Of the situation of the Greek Church of A. on the eve of the Arab occupation, which was to last almost nine centuries, we can form an idea by considering that this Church, already so flourishing under Athanasius and Cyril, after the formation of the Monophysite Coptic Church and after the Persian invasion counted barely 200,000 faithful belonging to the circles of officials, soldiers and merchants, that is, to the "foreigners," while the "indigenous" Coptic Church disposed of the imposing number of about 5-6,000,000 (almost the entire indigenous population). Ethiopia too, which had received its first bishop Frumentius from St. Athanasius, had withdrawn from the Greek Church of A. and submitted to the Monophysite Coptic patriarchate. The union, at least external, between the adherents of Cyrus the patriarch and the Monophysites on the basis of Monothelitism remained sterile.

IV. From the Arab occupation (638) to the Turkish conquest (1517)

While the Copts greeted the Arabs as liberators and soon received a situation of public right, the Melkites, as friends of the Greek troops, had to suffer under the new rulers. Moreover, as was said above, their patriarch was a Monothelite, and so was his successor Peter II (643-52); after his death the patriarchal see remained vacant for 73 years. The faithful, greatly reduced in number because of emigration or flight, had as pastors simple bishops subject to the metropolitan of Tyre or more precisely consecrated at Tyre. Their churches passed almost all into the hands of their adversaries, who made them into mosques and Monophysite temples. Under the caliph Hisham (724-43) the Greek Church of A. was able to be reorganized; the illiterate Cosmas (727-67) became patriarch; he was succeeded by the physician Politian. Consoling was the abjuration of the Monothelite heresy made by the patriarch Cosmas in 743, the participation of the Church of A. in the ecumenical councils VI, VII, VIII, the struggle of the Church of A. against iconoclasm. In the Photian struggles the patriarch of A. Michael I (859-71) followed their various events; he received a letter from Pope Nicholas I (written on 18 March 862) and shared the viewpoint of the Byzantine patriarch Ignatius during the VIII council, through a legate; however in 879 his successor Michael II in another legation supported, after the death of Ignatius, the cause of Photius who meanwhile, according to a very probable opinion, had set out on the path of agreement with Pope John VIII. It is not known what part the patriarch of A. had in the struggle of the patriarch Cerularius, but it seems that from the 12th century the Greek Church of A. drew fairly close to the Byzantine Church separated from Rome, since the patriarch Mark II (around 1195) had addressed a series of canonical questions to the patriarch of Antioch (resident at Constantinople) Theodore Balsamon. We have, however, a letter from the patriarch Nicholas I (around 1210) to Pope Innocent III in which he sets out the very sad situation caused by the persecution inflicted on his Church in the times of the crusades by the Muslim rulers; the Pope replied to him with letters of consolation. In 1367 the patriarch Niphon together with his colleagues of Constantinople and Jerusalem wrote a peaceful letter (union?) to Pope Urban V who replied with great charity. On the occasion of the Council of Florence the patriarch Philotheus associated himself with the union at least until the year 1443. In the 15th century, the Church of A. under the rule of the Mamluks was quite small, but neither did the Coptic Church have many faithful in Egypt. Had it not been for the so-called fondachi with consular protection in some cities of Egypt, the Christian citizens of the various Western powers and of the Byzantine empire residing in Egypt would have been even more harassed. From 1517 the lot of the Greek patriarchate of A. became worse with regard to its independence in the face of the Greek patriarchate of Constantinople, but in some sense there was an improvement in the face of the Turkish power, the new mistress of Egypt. One must, however, wait for the political action of Mohammed Ali, the founder of modern Egypt (1806-49), to see the Greek patriarch of A. begin to make himself independent of the predominant influence of the Phanar.

V. From the Turkish conquest (1517) to our own days

The patriarch Joachim Pany (1487-1567), who under the Mamluks had had often tragic difficulties, was able under the sultan Selim to begin a new phase of a less unhappy life. He, born in Athens, had fled from that city when it was taken by the Turks and had withdrawn to the monastery of Mount Sinai. Elected patriarch, he resided in a monastery in Cairo; in A. there were then four Christian churches, probably all or for the most part dependent on him. After the capture of Cairo, which cost the lives of very many citizens, he was able to contribute to improving the situation because of the changed political circumstances and of his relations with the court of Russia. He, according to a manuscript note that seems accurate, would have reached the age of 119 years. His successors Sylvester (1569-90), Meletius Pegas (1590-1601) and Cyril Lucaris (1602-20) were, as Cretans, subjects of the republic of Venice and could thus, for their own persons and for the good of their patriarchate, secure the protection of that State, then very powerful. During their ecclesiastical government the last two exercised their influence, especially against the union of the Ruthenians with the Catholic Church. Cyril Lucaris from 1620 became patriarch of Constantinople. Relations with Russia, begun under the patriarch Joachim Pany, were developed in the 17th and 18th centuries; of the relations of the patriarchate of A. with other Churches (Anglican, etc.) and with the Catholic Church we shall speak later. With Russia the patriarchs Gerasimus Spartaliotes (1620-39), who sent his protosyncellus Joseph to Moscow for the translation of Greek works into the Russian language; Paisios (1657-77), who took part in the Synod of Moscow that deposed the patriarch Nikon, and promoted higher studies in Russia, and others who asked the rich tsars for alms, had particular relations. When at the beginning of the 19th century the struggle for Greek independence began, the patriarchs of A., Theophilus I (1805-25) and Hierotheus (1825-45) dared to meddle in this policy. It should be noted that the patriarchs of this period established their residence in Constantinople, and this contributed to making the patriarchate of A. very exposed to the influence of the Phanar. This abnormal situation ceased in 1846; the Church of A. then counted only ten churches and two monasteries. The patriarch Sophronius IV (1870-99), formerly patriarch of Constantinople, acquired many merits for the ordering of ecclesiastical finances, and for the erection of new churches and chapels and of charitable institutions. The patriarch Photius (1900-1925) founded the two journals Ekklesiastikos Pharos and Pantainos; Meletius IV (1922-33) published in 1934 statutes concerning the election of the patriarch, founded an ecclesiastical seminary, had the manuscripts and books of the library of Cairo transferred to the library of the patriarchate in A. It deserves to be noted that in 1937 an agreement was stipulated between the patriarch and the Ministry of Naha Pasha concerning the election of the patriarch. A very difficult problem remains for A., namely that of eliminating the rivalry between the immigrant Greeks and the Syrians, also immigrants in recent times, because the new immigration of the two groups has totally changed the situation of the Greek patriarchate.

VI. Relations of the patriarchs of A. with the Anglicans, the "non-jurors" and other non-Catholics

The patriarch Cyril Lucaris sent in 1616 Metrophanes Kritopoulos with a letter to the Anglican archbishop Abbot of Canterbury to pursue studies of letters and theology in that kingdom; on another occasion, when he was no longer patriarch of A., he wrote again, sending him together with it a precious gift for King Charles I: the celebrated codex of Holy Scripture, known under the name of "Alexandrinus", today in the British Museum. Metrophanes Kritopoulos, after studying at Oxford, on his return visited several Protestant universities of Germany and composed on that occasion the noted Homologia ("Confessio fidei") which in some points approaches the Protestant doctrine. Returned to A., he became metropolitan of Memphis and in 1636 patriarch of A. He died in 1639 in Wallachia.

When the patriarch of A. Samuel Kapasoules in 1716 sent the metropolitan Arsenius of the Thebaid to England to seek money for his patriarchate burdened with debts, the Anglican sect of the "non-jurors" (opponents of the oath) took advantage of the occasion to initiate projects of union patronized by Tsar Peter I, but rejected by the Greek patriarchs in 1718 and 1723. The patriarch Fazio took part in the Stockholm conference and on his return died in Zurich on 4 Sept. 1925. Anglican ordinations were recognized by the patriarch of Alexandria in 1930.

VII. Letters of the patriarchs of A. to the Roman Pontiffs and to the Roman Curia

It cannot be doubted that Cyril Lucaris wrote a letter to Pope Paul V on 28 Oct. 1608 in which he openly declared his submission to the Supreme Pontiff on the basis of fidelity to the Roman Church. There remains only to resolve the problem of whether Lucaris wrote this letter either with every lack of sincerity, or with a "syncretistic" mentality, or with momentary sincerity while later he failed in fidelity to the word given to the Pope. Another patriarch of A., Samuel Kapasoules, made a profession of Catholic faith twice, on 6 June 1712 and on 19 June 1714. But on his perseverance in the Catholic faith there exist contradictory contemporary accounts, so that much caution is necessary in deciding in one sense or the other regarding the solution of this thorny question. Letters of courtesy were addressed by Metrophanes Kritopoulos (on 20 Jan. and 25 May 1637) to the cardinal prefect of the S. Congregation of Propaganda, Antonio Barberini, to obtain the admission of his two nephews into the Greek college of St. Athanasius in Rome, to which request the cardinal consented. The patriarch Gerasimus Palladas wrote three letters to Pope Clement XI, on 28 Nov. 1703, on 25 May 1704 and in Feb. 1712; all three letters are letters of recommendation or petitions in favor of certain persons. Finally the patriarch Cosmas III Kalokagathos complained in his letter to Pope Clement XII, of 4 July 1738, about the Latin missionaries; in the letter to the Congregation of Propaganda on 17 July 1738 he successfully requested the admission of a boy into a pontifical institute. The steward of this patriarch, the archpriest Abdalla, subscribed the profession of faith according to the formula of Urban VIII in the presence of Msgr. Giuseppe Simone Assemani and of another Catholic priest on 21 July 1738.

VIII. Statistics of the Melkite Church of A

The Greek patriarchate of A. has two patriarchal residences, namely in A. (monastery of St. Sabas) and in Cairo (monastery of St. Nicholas); nine metropolises: Tripoli, Leontopolis, Pelusium, Aksum (Ethiopia), Ptolemais, Nubia (Sudan), Hermopolis, Ioannoupolis, Carthage, with 94 churches, a clergy of 110 members, 52 communities, 90 schools with 570 teachers and 15,000 pupils, numerous charitable institutions.

Giorgio Hofmann

4. THE COUNCILS OF ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT

Among the councils celebrated in A. during the first four centuries, the following are to be noted:

1) Two councils, convoked against Origen by the bishop Demetrius, in 231 (and not in 223, as Baluze asserted). Origen, still a simple layman, but famous throughout the whole world for his writings, had himself ordained priest by the bishop Theoctistus, while he was passing through Caesarea in Palestine. This irritated Demetrius, who reproached him upon his return to A., reminding him of his voluntary mutilation: in fact the usage of the Church of A. was probably contrary to the ordination of eunuchs. Moreover, and this was the principal accusation, Origen had shortly before published the famous work De Principiis (Περὶ ἀρχῶν), in which bold and erroneous novelties appeared. A first council having then been assembled, at which bishops and priests took part, Demetrius deprived Origen of the right to teach and excluded him from the clergy of A.

Soon afterward, in the same year, another council followed, composed exclusively of bishops, in which Demetrius deposed and excommunicated Origen. The sentence was set forth in a synodal letter, sent to the bishops of Egypt and even to all Catholic bishops, if we give credence to an obscure passage, where St. Jerome attests that Rome also ratified the condemnation. It is certain that it was not accepted by the bishops of Palestine, of Arabia, of Phoenicia and perhaps not even by those of Cappadocia. But the question is still today full of obscurity (cf. Eusebius, Hist. eccl., VI, 8; Rufinus, Apologia, 2, 20; Hefele-Leclercq, I, pp. 156-59).

II. Two councils, assembled in 263 under the bishop St. Dionysius. The first condemns Sabellius, the second the millenarists Nepos and Cerinthus, who affirmed the necessity of bloody sacrifices (cf. Fabricius, Bibliotheca Graeca, ed. Harles, XII, Hamburg 1809, pp. 366-67). Hefele does not report these two councils, perhaps because their existence has not been sufficiently proved. We know nevertheless that Dionysius, in condemning Sabellius, seemed to fall into the opposite error, later called Arianism; wherefore, denounced at Rome, he had to explain himself.

III. The Council, convoked by St. Peter of A. around 306, against Meletius, bishop of Lycopolis, during a truce in the persecution of Diocletian. Very wise rules were promulgated there concerning the reconciliation of those who had apostatized in the first period of the persecution, of which nothing remains to us but the canons on the apostates published by P. de Lagarde, Religniae juris ecclesiastici antiquissimae, Leipzig 1865, pp. 63-73, 99-117 (Greek text with Syriac translation). Meletius was so embittered by this fact that he provoked a schism, organizing a separate Church (cf. A. d'Alès, Le dogme de Nicée, Paris 1926, pp. 203-242).

IV. The Council convened by the bishop Alexander against Arius, in 320 or in 321 (but not in 315), following the contradictory conference in which Arius himself and his adversaries had set forth their respective doctrine on the Trinity. Alexander, president of the council, declared the thought of Arius heterodox and imposed on him the duty of rejecting it. Arius refused, and then the Council of the Egyptian bishops condemned and excommunicated him with all his followers, among whom were two bishops, Secundus of Ptolemais and Theonas of Marmarica, five priests and six deacons (v. ARIANESIMO; ARIO); cf. St. Alexander, Depositio Arii: PG 17, 571 ff.

V. The Council of 324, assembled through the work of Hosius of Cordoba, sent to A. by the emperor Constantine, whose ecclesiastical adviser he was, to extinguish the affair of Arius, still in its beginnings, and to put an end to the earlier schisms of that Church. Besides the Meletian schism, which still endured, another broke out precisely on account of Arius. A certain Kolluthos, a priest of A., considering that the bishop Alexander had shown much consideration in dealing with Arius, had separated from him and had formed a schismatic group; moreover, although he was a simple priest, he had the audacity to ordain other priests, among them the famous Ischyras, with whom St. Athanasius later had to deal.

The Council also examined the paschal controversy and the question of the quartodecimans, without resolving them, just as it did not resolve that of Arius. It succeeded, however, in stifling the Kolluthian schism, annulling the ordinations of its author. On this council we have nothing but scanty information from St. Athanasius in the Apologia contra Arianos (64-65).

VI. The Council of 338 or of 339, assembled by St. Athanasius before his journey to Rome, whither Pope Julius was summoning him to re-examine his trial. The assembly counted about a hundred bishops, all dependents of A.; in it was declared groundless the accusation, directed by the Eusebians against St. Athanasius, according to which the holy prelate had appropriated the grain that Constantine had given to the widows of Egypt and of Libya. The synodal letter, a true apology of a valiant defender of the Council of Nicaea, was sent to Pope Julius and to the emperors Constantine II, Constans and Constantius (cf. St. Athanasius, Apologia contra Arianos, 5, 7-9, 18).

VII. The Council of 362, convoked by St. Athanasius, on his return to A. after his third exile, at the beginning of the reign of Julian the Apostate. This assembly was of particular importance, not for the number of bishops who took part in it (scarcely 21), but for their quality, for the nature and efficacy of the decisions taken there. There appeared not only the Egyptians but also the representatives of the other parts of Christendom, all persecuted and exiled for the faith of Nicaea. Present were the Palestinian Asterius of Petra, the Italian Eusebius of Vercelli, and some representatives of Lucifer of Cagliari, of Apollinaris of Laodicea, and of the priest Paulinus, head of the Eustathian community of Antioch.

Rufinus rightly called this gathering "the Council of the Confessors." The Fathers prescribed important decisions of a disciplinary and doctrinal character. Regarding the disciplinary question, they showed themselves somewhat indulgent toward the bishops who had failed in their duty during the Arian persecution, by subscribing to one of the numerous formulas successively imposed by the emperor Constantius. The leaders and defenders of the heresy were subjected to penance and reduced to lay communion. As for those who had yielded to violence or had allowed themselves to be deceived, and who were the majority, the Council kept them in their dignity after their prior subscription to the Nicene formula.

Regarding the doctrinal question, the Council, inspired by Athanasius, understood the situation very well. In fact it tolerated the terminology of many orthodox who gave to the word hypostasis (ὑπόστασις) the sense of person, while the others, in agreement with Western terminology, made of it a synonym of essence, or of substance (οὐσία). Once explanations were given, from then on it could be said that in God there were three hypostases. The divinity of the Holy Spirit was explicitly affirmed against the heresy of the pneumatomachi, the logical consequence of primitive Arianism. The nascent heresy of Apollinaris and the Christological dualism of Diodore of Tarsus were discreetly struck, without pointing out the authors.

The whole work of the Council was gathered into a synodal letter, addressed to the faithful of the Church of Antioch, then divided into three factions, whence the name of Tome of the Antiochenes. The letter was undoubtedly drafted by St. Athanasius and forms part of his works (PG 26, 793-810).

The decisions of the Council of Alexandria were generally adopted by the orthodox, not only in the East but also in the West, at least those concerning discipline. Pope Liberius approved them around 360; only the fiery Lucifer of Cagliari rejected them all and thus fell into schism (cf. Hefele-Leclercq, I, pp. 963-969; G. Bardy, in Storia della Chiesa published by A. Fliche-V. Martin, Italian version, III, Turin [1940], pp. 243-52).

Martin Jugie

5. THE ALEXANDRIAN RITE

1. History

Born in the capital of Egypt at the dawn of Christianity, the Alexandrian rite developed slowly in the time of Clement of Alexandria and of Origen, and after St. Athanasius, thanks to the monasticism of the desert, it reached a near maturity, although in the 4th and 5th centuries there was still room for local rites, not entirely supplanted by that of the patriarchal city. Through the work of St. Frumentius it was brought to Ethiopia. The uniformity that the strong centralization of the patriarchate could more easily than elsewhere have imposed was never achieved because of the Christological struggles of the 5th and 6th centuries; indeed, from that time there formed, alongside the rite of the Church of orthodox faith and Greek language, another rite, sprung from it, proper to the dissident Church, more numerous, of Monophysite faith and predominantly Coptic language. Preserving the common foundation, the primitive Alexandrian rite thus developed further under three different forms: the Greek, the Coptic and the Ethiopian, not without mutual influence. After the Arab conquest the orthodox lost all authority and, ever fewer in number, relied more on Byzantium; the rite was so affected by this that it ended up becoming entirely Byzantinized. This was the work of long centuries; finally, the negative reply of the Byzantine canonist Theodore Balsamon to the patriarch of Alexandria on the use of the liturgy of St. Mark (end of the 12th century) marked the death of the Alexandrian rite in the Greek language and of orthodox doctrine (PG 138, 953). Moreover, the small number of Egyptian orthodox accepted the Arabic versions of the Byzantine liturgy made by the Melkites of Syria in the 17th century.

Of the Alexandrian rite that disappeared in the 12th century there remain a certain number of documents, most important for the history of the liturgy.

The Mass. - The Liturgy of St. Mark is the genuine and characteristic Mass of Alexandria; with its same Ordo communis (that is, the fixed parts of the Mass) two other anaphoras were used, that of St. Basil and that of St. Gregory the Theologian, which came from Asia Minor; on the other hand, the Sacramentary of Serapion, bishop of Thmuis, and the incomplete anaphora found in the papyrus of Dêr Balizeh are also Egyptian, but of merely provincial origin and use. Of other Mass formularies there remain passages too fragmentary to be able to increase our knowledge of the rite. The Liturgy of St. Mark has come down to us in five manuscripts, late (12th-16th century), more or less contaminated by Byzantine influence (cf. C. A. Swainson, The Greek Liturgies, Cambridge 1884, pp. 1-73); the Strasbourg papyrus (4th-5th century; cf. M. Andrieu and P. Collomp, Fragments sur papyrus de l'anaphore de s. Marc, in Rev. des Sciences relig., 8 [1928], pp. 489-515), and that of the John Rylands Library (6th century; cf. C. H. Roberts, Catalogue of the Greek and Latin Papyri, III, Manchester 1938, no. 465) contain precious texts of the anaphora, but only fragmentary ones. There is therefore a real difficulty in presenting this Liturgy, especially in the part of its Ordo communis, as it was at the time of its flourishing.

The general structure is that of the Christian sacrifice in any rite: at the beginning the preparation of the celebrant, of the altar, of the oblations, then the scriptural readings interspersed with chants and prayers, and after the Gospel the great supplication: all this forms the Mass of the catechumens. With the three solemn prayers for the Church, the hierarchy and the assembly of the faithful, the transfer of the oblations onto the altar, the kiss of peace and the recitation of the Creed, everything is ready to begin the great eucharistic prayer. This consists of the parts usual, but in an order, as regards the intercessory prayer, entirely particular; after it, the fraction, the Pater Noster and the manual acts prepare for Communion. The thanksgiving, the blessing and the dismissal end the holy Sacrifice.

The Alexandrian elements are easily distinguished in this Liturgy of St. Mark: the prayer of thanksgiving with which almost every office and also the Mass begins, the formula of absolution partially included in the prayer of incense before the little entrance, the great supplication after the Gospel with its petition for the waters of the Nile, the three solemn prayers, the whole anaphora with its particular order, the prayer of the fraction, then many small formulas still preserved today by the Copts in the original language, or those of the deacon that interrupt the great eucharistic prayer: "sit down," "stand up," "look" toward the East; and those of the people before and after the words of consecration: "We believe that this is true, amen, amen, amen; and we believe and glorify and confess." No less clear are the foreign elements introduced under Byzantine influence: the little entrance with the singing of the "Monogenès" and followed by the Trisagion; only two readings from Holy Scripture; the great entrance with the singing of the Cherubikon, the transfer of the Creed after the kiss of peace, and that of the manual acts (intinction, presentations, mingling) after the Pater Noster, finally the prayer of thanksgiving which is that of the Liturgy of St. Basil.

The Liturgy of St. Basil and that of St. Gregory have come down to us only in the Greek-Arabic manuscript

(Graec. 325 of the National Library of Paris, 14th century; cf. Renaudot, I, 127-65). Of the Ordo communis and of the Mass of the catechumens there is almost nothing; the influence of the Byzantine Liturgy and of the Syriac one of St. James is manifest. Despite this, the anaphora of St. Basil presents a recension quite different from the Byzantine one and shorter; hence, against the prevailing opinion that it is an abbreviation of the Byzantine one, H. Engberding sought to prove by minute analysis of the different recensions of the Basilian Liturgy handed down to us in various languages, that the Egyptian recension would be the primitive one, which, amplified by biblical citations and theological thoughts from St. Basil, made its way under the name of the holy Doctor (Das Eucharistische Hochgebet der Basiliostilurgie, Münster 1931). This hypothesis has received the assent of many liturgists, though not of all.

The Liturgy of St. Gregory, also ancient, directs all its prayers to Jesus Christ, probably in reaction against Arianism. The Liturgy of St. Mark in its Coptic version was attributed to St. Cyril; the other two were also translated into Coptic; there exists, however, a Greek text, with an Ordo communis for that of St. Basil, which was in use in the Monophysite Coptic Church (cf. H. G. Evelyn White, The Monasteries of the Wadi'n Natrân, part I, New York 1926, pp. 200-213).

The so-called "Sacramentary" of Serapion, bishop of Thmuis, friend of St. Athanasius, is a collection of thirty prayers (cf. J. F. Funk, Didascalia, II, Paderborn 1906, pp. 158-81); each of them bears its own title. The first contains the whole anaphora: the order curiously split in two for obvious reasons of symmetry (J. M. Hanssens, Institutiones liturg., III, pp. 360-63) has suggested a second redactor; (cf. the study with definitive conclusions by B. Capelle, L'anaphore de Sérapion, Essai d'exégèse, in Muséon, 59 [1944], pp. 425-43); moreover, its epiclesis asks God, in order to effect the transmutation, not for the sending of the Holy Spirit but of the Logos; three other post-anaphoral prayers follow. Eleven prayers that have relations with the Mass of the catechumens are found only at the end of the collection. It is not to be thought that the use of these prayers ever extended outside the diocese of Thmuis.

Particular to some region or monastery will also have been that anaphora found in a 7th-century papyrus from the monastery of Dêr Balizeh in Upper Egypt (the edition is due to Ch. Wessely, in PO 18, 424-29). Schermann wished to attribute it to the 2nd century, but it is agreed today in affirming that it does not go back beyond the end of the 4th century (cf. R. H. Connolly, in Journ. Theol. Stud., 28 [1927], p. 82). From the fragments its structure can be reconstructed, which is that common to the Eastern anaphoras, except that the epiclesis is found before the consecration.

Two, in fact, are the interesting problems posed by these Egyptian liturgies: that of the epiclesis and that of the intercession. In the anaphora of St. Mark and in that of Serapion, there is found, in the prayer after the Sanctus, an epiclesis in formation: no explicit petition for transmutation is yet made; in the papyrus of Dêr Balizeh the petition is already explicit. But in imitation of the Syrians and the Byzantines the anaphora of St. Mark has also adopted a formal epiclesis after the Consecration which probably took the place of another prayer that was originally found there. This prayer, which perhaps was also found in the anaphora of Dêr Balizeh, asked for the acceptance of the sacrifice on the heavenly altar

(cf. P. De Puniet, A propos de la nouvelle anaphore égyptienne, in Echos d'Orient, 13 [1910], pp. 72-76; A. Baumstark, Le Liturgie Orientali e le preghiere «supra quae» e «Supplices» del Canone Romano, Grottaferrata 1913, p. 414; id., Liturgie comparée, p. 28). This hypothesis is confirmed by two Syriac anaphoras, those of Timothy and of Severus, composed in Greek in Egypt: they have preserved the prayer of acceptance that immediately precedes the epiclesis (cf. Anaphorae syriacae, I, Rome 1939, pp. 23, 71).

The intercessory prayer has an unusual place in the anaphora of St. Mark and in the Coptic one of St. Cyril; it attaches itself abruptly, without transition of any kind, to the first prayer of the anaphora: "Vere dignum et iustum est"; and after it, there is found again that customary passage that makes mention of the Angels, of the Cherubim, and serves as an introduction to the Sanctus. James of Edessa (6th century) noted the place of that intercession as a particularity of the Alexandrian Fathers (cf. Epistula ad Thomam presbyterum, in Dionysius bar Salibi, Expositio liturgiae, in Corp. Script. Or. Christ., Script. Syri, LXIII, p. 10). Today some authors, exaggerating the importance of this fact, make of it the characteristic note that differentiates the Alexandrian rite from every other Eastern rite. Attempts have been made in various ways to explain that place of the intercession and the question has been asked whether that place is truly primitive (cf. A. Gastoué, s. v. in DACL; A. Baumstark, in Oriens Christianus, I [1901], p. 4; J. M. Hanssens, Imtit. liturg., III, p. 478).

Sacraments and other rites. - Of the other parts of the Alexandrian rite in use among the Orthodox we have scant information. The rite of baptism included the solemn renunciation of Satan, the confession of faith, the blessing of the water, the anointings, the triple immersion; with this the first-person formula was used: "Ego te baptizo...". Ordination was conferred on the deacon, the priest and the bishop with the imposition of hands. From the fact that the Sacramentary of Serapion contains prayers for the oil of the sick and for the dead, one may conclude that similar prayers existed in the patriarchal Church. There remains a simple note that proves the existence of a Mass of the Presanctified of St. Mark (Renaudot, I, pp. 79 and 341). To Egypt also belongs a solemn blessing of the Nile (cf. A. Dmitrievskij, Εὐχολογία, Kiev 1901, p. 684). It is known that in the churches of the great city the people took part with fervor in the divine offices because they could intercalate tropes between the verses of the psalms, while the monks of the desert condemned such a use as profane. In the lesser hours, the Coptic rite of today sings tropes and theotokia that are those of the Byzantine rite: the link between the two rites was that of the Orthodox of A. To St. Cyril of A. are attributed the greater hours of the Byzantine office of Good Friday. Some ancient hymns were collected by Schermann. We can gain a sense of the number of feasts celebrated in a small city from the Synaxarion of Oxyrhynchus of the 6th century (cf. Anal. Bolland., 42 [1924], pp. 83-99). As for liturgical vestments, the oldest illustration of an omophorion and a phelonion are those worn by the bishop Theophilus in a papyrus codex of the 5th century (cf. Alexandrische Weltchronik, edited by A. Bauer and J. Strzygowski, pl. VI).

Alfonso Raes

6. THE ARMENIAN DIOCESE OF ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT

The history of the Armenian colony of Egypt (probably devoted to commerce) goes back to the times of the pharaohs; and during the long Arab domination, the relation between Egypt and the Armenians became more pronounced.

Around the year 1076 the first bishop of this Armenian colony appears, which then numbered about 30,000 souls. He was Gregory Pahlav, nephew of the katholikos of the same name, called Vkaiaser (martyr-lover), who during a visit to this colony, having ascertained its flourishing state, before leaving Egypt consecrated his said nephew as bishop for the Armenians. In 1922 three Armenian inscriptions were found in a Coptic monastery of the city of Sohak in Upper Egypt relating to the visit of Vkaiaser Katholikos.

The Armenian Catholic community in Egypt, beginning in 1849, was directed by a patriarchal vicar of the see of Cilicia. In 1885 it was erected as an episcopal see and as such continues to this day.

7. ALEXANDRIA OF EGYPT OF THE COPTS

The Council of Nicaea (325) confirmed the primacy of A. and thus that patriarchate arose as second in dignity after Rome. The Council of Chalcedon (451) assigned the second place to Constantinople (can. 18) and then the native Egyptians, having taken the name of Copts, embraced Monophysitism and from 457 gave rise to the series of their patriarchs alongside that of the Catholic-Byzantine ones, also Alexandrian. In 1741 the first apostolic vicar of the Catholic Copts was appointed and in 1899 the first patriarch was had, who resigned in 1908. From that year an apostolic administrator held the patriarchate, until on 9 Aug. 1947 the new patriarch was appointed, while to the ancient dioceses of Hermopolis and Thebes the new one of Assiut was added. The Catholic faithful of the Coptic patriarchate are (1947) 65,000: the Monophysites, on the other hand, 2 million.

Pietro Sfair

8. ARCHAEOLOGY

The second city of the Roman empire had at the end of the 2nd century A.D. a population composed of Hellenes, among whom the Christians were quite numerous; it is celebrated on account of its catechetical school, τῆς κατηγήσεως Διδασκαλείων, a kind of Christian university, center of theology: but the information relating to its Christian community is unfortunately almost all literary, not monumental.

Eusebius provides us with the documentation of the persecutions that struck the Church of A. and a list of its principal martyrs. In the times of Septimius Severus: Leonides, father of Origen, Plutarch, Serenus, Heraclides, Heron, Erais (according to Delehaye this would be the Ethiopian saint Emmerayes), Potamiaena, Marcella, Basilides. Under Decius: Metra, Quinta, Paula, Serapion, Julian, Cronion, Besas, Macarius, Epimachus, Alexander, Ammonaria, Mercuria, Dionysia, Ater, Isidore, Dioscorus, Nemesius, Ammon, Zeno, Ptolemy, Ingenuus, Theophilus, Ischyrion. Under Diocletian: Philoromus, the bishop Peter of A., with the priests Faustus, Dius, Ammonius, and the bishops Phileas, Hesychius, Pachomius, Theodore (besides Eusebius, Hist. Eccl., VI,

1-5; 41-2; VII, 11, 20; VIII, 9, 6; 10, 13; 13,5; 13,7; Clement of Alexandria, Stromat., II, 20, 125; cf. H. Delehaye, Les martyrs d'Égypte, Brussels 1923, offprint from Analecta Ballandiana, 40 [1922]).

The ancient Christian tombs in A. were both in the open and underground, scattered immediately to the east and west outside the city; but their destruction intensified from the 19th century to obtain lime-stone, as G. B. Brocchi already reported as early as 1822 in the archaeological observations of his travel journal in Egypt.

On the coast, between Ibramich and Mustafa Pasha, in 1886 pagan, Jewish and Christian tombs were found together with Greek and Roman sarcophagi (T. D. Néroutsos, L'ancienne Alexandrie, Paris 1888, p. 81). But there were also true Christian cemeteries. St. Peter bishop of A. was buried εἰς τὸ κοιμητήριον (BHG, 2, 1502).

The type of Christian burial in the form of a hypogeum dug into the limestone rock is, in its structure, identical to the pagan inhumation ones, so frequent in A.; some of these are datable to the 3rd century B.C. and Adriani holds that they do not belong to imported types, but are original products of the city's funerary architecture (Annuaire du musée gréco-romain, 1933-35, Alexandria 1936, p. 171).

C. Wescher reported in 1865 to G. B. De Rossi the discovery of a Christian hypogeum found in 1858 toward the southwestern extremity of A., with an entrance in the side of the hill; a stairway led into an apsed vestibule, on whose walls could be distinguished a series of paintings in two layers, representing the enthroned Redeemer, haloed, with the letters ἰς xῶς and near him twelve baskets full of loaves, St. Andrew (ΑΝΔΡΕΑC) carrying a dish with two fish, then St. Peter (ΠΕΤΡΟC), St. John the Evangelist, St. Mark; one then passed into a quadrangular hall with three adjoining chapels with paintings of angels and prophets, of which the names of Daniel and Isaiah remain; in the corner John the Baptist with a scroll containing in Greek the prophecy of Isaiah, cited in Mt. 3:3 and Mk. 1:3. On the vault winged angels prostrate themselves before the Redeemer. From this hall one enters a vaulted gallery containing 32 loculi. De Rossi dated the paintings to the Byzantine era (Bull. arch. crist., 3 [1865], p. 57; V. Schultze, Die Katakomben, Leipzig 1882, p. 282). The scenes were re-examined by Wilpert (Eucharistische Malereien der Katakomben Karmouz in Alexandria, in Ehrengabe Deutschen Wissenschaft dargebsten von Katolischen Gelehrten, Freiburg 1920, pp. 273-82), who corrected some interpretations, recognizing in one part the remains of the scene of the marriage at Cana, and maintained the liturgical-eucharistic character of the frescoes, seen for the last time by Richter in 1876 and afterward destroyed. He confirmed De Rossi's dating, between the 5th and 6th centuries.

In 1871 a Christian hypogeum was found in the eastern necropolis, east of the Delta quarter; it was called that of Zoneina after the name of a deceased woman, who died on 19 March of the year 409 (G. Botti, Le iscrizioni cristiane di A. d'Egitto, in Bessarione, 7 [1900], pp. 270-81, inscription no. 15; T. D. Néroutsos, op. cit., p. 82).

In 1876, east of the village of Karmuz, the hypogeum called that of Rufina was discovered, on account of an inscription found there, but not certainly Christian; it is now destroyed.

In the same year two hypogea were discovered at Qabarry, beyond the canal; the first contains an invocation to Osiris; the second is certainly Christian: the tomb of Theodatus and Ma-Ammon with an invocation to the Lord.

In 1887, on the road to Mustafa Pasha, the hypogeum called Mustafa was found (A. L. Frothingham, Archaeological News, in American Journal of Archaeology, 3 [1887], pp. 146 and 411).

But most of all these hypogea were already destroyed by 1888.

Epiphanius (Adv. haeres, II, 2, 69, 2: PG 42, 204-205) writes that in A. many churches in the time of Diocletian often received their name not from a saint but from a donor.

The oldest church of A. of which there is record is the one erected by Bishop Theonas (282-300), restored by Bishop Alexander (313-26), situated toward the western harbor (Athanasius, Apol. ad Const. imp. 15: PG 25, 613; id., De Juga: PG 25, 676). It was also called τῆς ἁγίας Παρθένου Μαρίας καὶ Θεομήνηρος (Sophronius: PG 87, 3460). Christmas was still celebrated there in the 8th century. It was transformed by the Arabs into the western mosque, or Gamā'at-el-Garbjut, that is, of the thousand columns. It was destroyed between 1798 and 1829 (E. D. J. Dutilh, Deux colonnes de l'église de Théonas, in Bulletin de la Société Royale d'Archéologie d'Alexandrie, 7 [1904], p. 55). Dominicum Dionysii: a church erected by Bishop Athanasius in 370 on the site of the ancient Forum, in the βενδίδειον. Transformed into a mosque by the Arabs. It preserved a great number of ancient materials, among them columns of cipollino and red granite, Byzantine capitals, a variegated monolithic vessel carved from a precious block of Egyptian breccia. Basilica of St. Mark: near the eastern harbor in the quarter called βουκόλια; it contained the relics of the Evangelist. In a homily attributed to St. Cyril (PG 77, 1101) mention is made of three holy virgins: Theotista, Theodota and Eudocia, whose sacred spring was shown in the basilica of St. Mark; they are said to have been martyred at the same time as Sts. Cyrus and John, also buried in the same basilica, the former a monk, the latter a soldier. The patriarch Cyril had their tombs opened in order to transport them to Menuthis. The basilica of St. Mark burned in 640, was rebuilt in 680 by the Jacobite patriarch John III. In 828 Venetian merchants took from it the relics of St. Mark to transport them to Venice (M. Chaine, L'église de Saint-Marc à A. construite par le patriarche Jean de Samanoud, in Revue de l'Orient Chrétien, 24 [1928], pp. 372-86). In the great church of the Tetrapylon there was an image of Jesus Christ surrounded by the B. Virgin, by the Apostles, by Prophets and by martyrs, before whom Sts. Cyrus and John prostrated themselves. Sanctuary of Saturn: transformed into a Christian church by Bishop Alexander (313-26). Cathedral: built by transforming the Caesareum; it was called μεγάλη ἐκκλησία or Κυριακόν. Sacked by the comes Heraclius in 356, restored and reopened in 365, seized and destroyed by the pagans in 366; Bishop Athanasius began its reconstruction in 368. It passed to the Jacobites in 641, to the Orthodox in 727, and was destroyed by fire in 912. Church of St. John the Baptist, whose relics were brought to A. in 396; the building stood on the Serapeum, and there the body of St. Anthony Abbot was deposited (PG 26, 971). Church of St. Michael: adapted by Bishop Alexander (313-26) in the temple of Kronos, situated in the Jewish quarter. Church of Arcadius: erected by the patriarch Theophilus in the place called ἀγγέλιον, in honor of Arcadius, son of the emperor. Church of St. Metra: situated in the eastern zone. Church of the three youths of Babylon: founded by Bishop Apollinaris (d. 568) in the place called Δόρυξιν. The building contained the consultation chamber of St. Cyrus and a relic of one of the three youths. Church of St. Victor: mentioned by Cosmas Indicopleustes. Church of St. Dorothea: mentioned by John Moschus (PG 87, 2929). Church of St. Julian, with his relics. Church of St. Serapion. Church of Sts. Pierius and Isidore.

On the island of Pharos, the churches of St. Faustus and St. Sophia.

Outside A., the sanctuary of St. Menna or Abā Minā. At Menuthis, on the road to Canopus, stood the temple of Isis. Cyril of A., having taken the relics of Sts. Cyrus and John from the basilica of St. Mark, wished to transport them to Menuthis, building in their honor a sanctuary between the seashore and a hill; it soon became a destination of pilgrims not only from Egypt and Libya, but from every region of the empire. Sophronius of Damascus went there between 610 and 620, and he (PG 87, 3560) reports on more than seventy miracles that occurred in his time (G. Lumbroso, Santuario dei SS. Ciro e Giovanni presso Alessandria, in Atti della R. Accademia dei Lincei, Sez. III, Memorie, III, Rome 1878-79, pp. 356-59).

St. Jerome recalls (PL 23, 65) the monastery called that of the Metanoia, founded by Theophilus of A. on the road to Canopus; it was a Pachomian cenobium; another monastery in A. was dedicated to the popular local saint St. Victor (P. Barison, Ricerche sui monasteri dell'Egitto bizantino ed arabo secondo i documenti dei papiri greci, in Aegyptus, 18 [1938], pp. 29-148).

As regards Christian epigraphy, Lefebvre published 57 Greek inscriptions from A.; he emphasized that the three formulas current in A. are: εὐφύγει, μνησθεῖν ὁ Θεὸς τῆς κοιμήσεως καὶ ἀναπαύσεως, εὐκρίθη (G. Lefebvre, Recueil des inscriptions chrétiennes d'Égypte, Cairo 1907). But the inscriptions do not belong to the first three centuries; most are not earlier than the 5th. One (no. 39) perhaps belongs to the patriarch Achillas (d. 313); no. 4 refers to a physician; no. 3 to a baker; no. 5 to a gardener.

Several times G. Lumbroso and others illustrated before the Society of Cultors of Christian Archaeology terracotta lamps of the so-called African type with Christian subjects coming from A.; some bear in monogram or in full the name of saints venerated in A. De Rossi pointed out that this type of lamp was manufactured for certain sanctuaries; pilgrims lit them during their prayers in the sanctuaries and then kept them as a souvenir (other examples in G. Lefebvre, op. cit., nos. 730, 732).

Numerous too are the ampullae in terracotta; among these one of the oldest with the monogram E and St. Menna with the title MAPTYC (Bulletin de l'Institut Égyptien, 1874-75, p. 108). Other examples in A. listed by Lefebvre (nos. 690-716).

A. was a center of artistic production of great importance until the 6th century, with workshops for working in stone, ivory, fabrics and miniatures: cf. J. Strzygowski, Hellenistische und koptische Kunst in A., Vienna 1902. The same author, as early as 1899, had proposed (in Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 8 [1899], p. 678) to attribute to Antioch or its school the ivories of the ivory chair of Maximian in Ravenna, which Wulff instead believed should be ascribed to Syrian workshops established in A., defined as the cradle of Christian art. E. Baldwin-Smith in turn wrote The Alexandrian origin of the chair of Maximianus, in American Journal of Archaeology, 21 (1917), p. 22, recognizing in that chair a product of the Hellenistic tradition of A. with Syrian and Palestinian influences.

E. Weigand, however, in Kritische Berichte zur Kunstgeschichtlichen Literatur, (1930-31), p. 31, opposes the comparison with both sacred and consular diptychs of the 6th century.

The latter were issued by Eastern consuls, therefore from Constantinople he derives both the diptychs and the chair, which E. Capps suggests was executed by Alexandrian workshops existing in Constantinople. More recently C. R. Morey establishes in A. an Egyptian center for the production of ivories (Gli oggetti di avorio e di osso del museo sacro Vaticano, I, Vatican City 1936). E. Sjöqvist and A. Westholm recognize in the porphyry sarcophagi of St. Helena of the 2nd century and of St. Constance of the 4th, two products of the school of A. (Zur Zeitbestimmung der Helenaund Constantinoprophage, Skrifter utgiana o Svenska Institutet i Rom, IV, I, Lund 1934). Thus F. Volbach sees in the lotus-leaf capitals an origin also Alexandrian (Intorno ai capitelli a foglia di loto in Ravenna in Felix Ravenna, 44 [1944], pp. 124-29).

Also for the ivory now in the Louvre in which Strzygowski proposed to identify St. Mark and his successors in the foreground and in the background the city of A., Duchesne instead held that it was St. Paul and the city of Troas.

Enrico Josi