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Caesareum of Alexandria

Field	Value
name	Caesareum
status	Destroyed
building_type	Built as a temple; converted to a Christian church (late-4th century)
client	Cleopatra VII (started)
Augustus (finished)
location_town	Alexandria
location_country	Egypt
completion_date	1st century BC
renovation_date	4th century (converted to Christian church)
destruction_date	19th century

Augustus (finished)

The Caesareum of Alexandria is an ancient temple in Alexandria, Egypt. It was conceived by Cleopatra VII of the Ptolemaic kingdom, the last pharaoh of ancient Egypt, to honour her first known lover Julius Caesar or Mark Antony. The edifice was finished by the Roman emperor Augustus, after he defeated Mark Antony and Cleopatra in Egypt. He destroyed all traces of Antony in Alexandria, and apparently dedicated the temple to his own cult.

Converted to a Christian church in the late 4th century, the Caesareum was the headquarters of Cyril of Alexandria, the Patriarch of Alexandria from 412 to 444.

The philosopher and mathematician Hypatia was murdered at the Caesareum by a Christian mob in 415; they stripped her naked and tore her to pieces.

Elements of the temple survived until the 19th century. Cleopatra's Needles, two much earlier obelisks moved to the temple in ancient times, now stand in Central Park in New York City and on the Thames Embankment, in London. The underwater archaeological work of Franck Goddio and the European Institute for Underwater Archaeology (IEASM) in the eastern harbour of Alexandria has added to the knowledge about the Caesareum. An article "The Caesarium", published in 2021, reveals that the groundworks were started prior to the reign of Cleopatra VII. It also considers the building's relationship with the harbour based on ancient texts and the position of Cleopatra's Needles and it provides some indications about the siting of the temple itself.

Today, a large statue of the Alexandrine nationalist leader Saad Zaghloul (1859–1927) stands on the Caesareum site.

References

Fletcher, Joann. (2008). "Cleopatra the Great: The Woman Behind the Legend". Harper.
Centre d'Études Alexandrines. (2022). "Le Césaréum".
McKenzie, Judith. (2007). "The Architecture of Alexandria and Egypt, c. 300BC to AD 700". Yale University Press.
Staff. (2012). "The Caesarium of Alexandria – Scene of the Crime". cosmographica.com.
Socrates Scholasticus. "Ecclesiastical History, Bk VI: Chap. 15".
Ellis, Simon P.. (September 2023). "Graeco-Roman Egypt". [[Osprey Publishing]].
"The sunken ancient port of Alexandria".
Franck Goddio, Catherine Grataloup (pottery): The Caesarium, edited by Damian Robinson, Franck Goddio, "Constructing, Remaking and Dismantling Sacred Landscapes in Lower Egypt from the Late Dynastic to the Early Medieval Period", Oxford Centre for Maritime Archaeology Monograph, volume 11. University of Oxford, Oxford 2021, {{ISBN. 978-1-9989943-0-4.

Info: Wikipedia Source

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