BABYLONIA OF EGYPT. - A city of ancient Lower Egypt, situated in the region from which the canal from the Nile to the Red Sea departed.

Despite the legends reported by ancient historians (Ctesias, Fragm., ed. Dindorf, Paris, II, 13; Diodorus Siculus, I, 56; Flavius Josephus, Ant. Iud., I, 15, 1), which attribute its foundation to Assyro-Babylonian prisoners, it was in reality a purely Egyptian city, earlier than the XVIIIth dynasty. It is identified with Her-'aba, already mentioned on the Palermo Stone (Hir-'b'), which lies south of the present-day "Old Cairo." Here the Romans built a fortress, called Babylon, which still survives today under the name Qasr al-Sām. The Arabs of 'Amr ibn al-'As, having conquered it (641), enlarged it into a city, called al-Fusṭat (from the Latin Jossatum), the present-day "Old Cairo" (over 50,000 inhabitants). The ancient name survived: Babiljūn, today Dejr-Bāblūn, is part of the ancient fortress. In the Middle Ages the ruler of Egypt was called "sultan of Babylon." In the 5th century B. appears as the seat of a Catholic bishopric under the name of Bablun.

The Copts, along with some rare exegetes, say that St. Peter wrote his first letter there (cf. 1 Pt. 5, 13).

Bibliography2 works

BIBL.: H. Gauthier, Dictionnaire des noms géographiques, IV, p. 203 ff.; A. H. Gardiner, Ancient Egyptian Onomastica, II, pp. 131-44.

Giustino Boson

@incollection{ec2_babilonia_d_egitto, author = {Boson, Giustino}, title = {Babilonia d'Egitto}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {II}, pages = {638}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1949}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/babilonia-d-egitto} }

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Babylonia of Egypt

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