Alexandria
Alexandria begins at the water. The Corniche runs along the Mediterranean for miles, and on a clear morning the light off the sea is sharp enough to make you squint before you've had coffee. This is a city that has been remade repeatedly — by Ptolemies, Romans, Arabs, Napoleon, the British — and the layers show in the stones if you know where to look.
The modern Bibliotheca Alexandrina, completed in 2002, sits close to where scholars once worked alongside Euclid and Eratosthenes. The Roman theatre at Kom al-Dikka, discovered by accident in 1960, still has its 13 tiers of white and grey marble intact. Alexandria rewards the curious walker more than the itinerary-follower.
How Alexandria came to be
Alexander the Great chose this site in 332 BCE for its deep anchorage off the island of Pharos and the freshwater access provided by Lake Maryūṭ — practical reasons that would underpin one of antiquity's most consequential cities. After Alexander's death in 323 BCE, Ptolemy I Soter took control and founded the dynasty that would turn Alexandria into the Mediterranean's foremost centre of scholarship. The Mouseion research institute drew Archimedes, Ptolemy and Eratosthenes. The Pharos lighthouse, erected in 279 BCE, stood for over a thousand years.
Rome absorbed the city in 30 BCE under Octavian. The Arabs took it in 641 CE and shifted Egypt's capital to Fustat on the Nile, beginning a long decline. Napoleon's army arrived in 1798; the British followed. It was the viceroy Mohammad Ali who rebuilt Alexandria's importance in the early 19th century, setting the stage for the layered, sea-facing city you find today.
Who and what shaped it
People who shaped it
Landmark buildings
See Alexandria in motion
Plan your visit
On the map
When to go
Summers (June–August) are hot and humid along the coast, though sea breezes keep temperatures more bearable than inland Egypt. Winters are mild but can bring rain and occasional grey stretches; spring and autumn are the most reliably pleasant seasons for walking the city.
Right now
Background & history adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA) · specs from Wikidata (CC0) · weather from Open-Meteo · map data © OpenStreetMap contributors · photos from Wikimedia Commons / Unsplash with per-image credit. No third-party reviews or social posts reproduced.