Presentation of the department
The Bibliotheca Alexandrina Excavations collection is among
the most important collections in the Antiquities Museum as it reflects
the remarkable artistic style and reveals the nature of the daily life
during the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods. It is also regarded
as the core of the Museum collections, as it was discovered during the
construction of the New Bibliotheca Alexandrina.
The BA Antiquities section comprises 111 artifacts, the most important of which are the marvelous mosaics which are believed to have paved the floors of the royal palaces that once stood in this region.
The BA Antiquities section comprises 111 artifacts, the most important of which are the marvelous mosaics which are believed to have paved the floors of the royal palaces that once stood in this region.
The New Library of Alexandria
In the center of the ancient royal district of Alexandria and
somewhere in front of the site of the head of "Lochias", where is
called now Al-Silsilah, a piece of land belonging to the Alexandria
University having the area of 85.000m², has been chosen to revive the
ancient Library which was the beacon of knowledge and culture, a
research institute and the substructure of the ancient university.
The site surveillance started in the year 1993 and unfolded some
demolished architectural elements which were not in their original site
within the debris, where the excavational pits bore hundreds of
antiquities which most of them date back to the Hellenistic era.
These founds acted as the nuclei of the current Antiquities Museum
which contains a number of parts fetched from most likely all museums
all over Egypt, to make the display within the museum complete, giving
an idea about all civilizations which passed alternatively on Egypt,
starting by the Pharaonic era and passing through the Graeco-Roman,
Hellenistic, then the Byzantine and finally the Islamic. The museum also
includes a collection of sunken antiquities which were found in the
Eastern Harbor and in the district of Abo-kir.
The Antiquities Museum inside the Bibliotheca Alexandrina is solely
unique that it is built within the sancta of a library, which embodies
the luster of the world's most famous library, also it holds on display
the first collection of sunken antiquities worldwide.