The Ancients - Alexandria: The Sunken City

Episode Date: April 2, 2023

The Egyptian city of Alexandria was one of the greatest cities of the ancient Mediterranean world. Founded by Alexander the Great himself in 323BC, the metropolis was nurtured by his successors in Egypt, the Ptolemies, and flourished throughout the Late Hellenistic and Roman Imperial periods. Its famed lighthouse was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the lost tombs of Alexander and even Cleopatra are believed to be there. The legacy endures to this day, but a significant portion of the ancient city is now underwater, lying beneath the eastern harbour of modern Alexandria.In this episode, Tristan is joined by leading expert on the sunken city of Alexandria, Franck Goddio to discuss this dramatic period of history. As an underwater archaeologist who has excavated the submerged city for many years, Franck shares his immense knowledge of the site. Revealing what some of his team’s incredible finds have shown about this underwater metropolis, and trying to separate fact from fiction, just what do we know about this sunken city?The Senior Producer was Elena GuthrieThe Assistant Producer was Annie ColoeMixed & edited by Aidan LonerganFor more Ancients content, subscribe to our Ancients newsletter here. If you'd like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - enter promo code ANCIENTS for a free trial, plus 50% off your first three months' subscription. To download, go to Android > or Apple store >

Hi, I'm Tristan Hughes, and if you would like the Ancient ad-free, get early access and bonus episodes, sign up to History Hit. With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries, including my recent documentary all about Petra and the Nabataeans, and enjoy a new release every week. Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com slash subscribe. by visiting historyhit.com slash subscribe. Whether you're in your running era, Pilates era, or yoga era, dive into Peloton workouts that work with you. From meditating at your kid's game to mastering a strength program,

they've got everything you need to keep knocking down your goals. No pressure to be who you're not, just workouts and classes to strengthen who you are. So no matter your era, make it your best with Peloton. Find your push. Find your power. Peloton. Visit Peloton at onepeloton.ca. It's the Ancients on History Hit. I'm Tristan Hughes, your host, and in today's episode we're talking about one of the great cities of the ancient Mediterranean world, the city of Alexandria. Founded by Alexander the Great in around 332 BC, developed by his successors in Egypt, the Ptolemies, flourishing in the late Hellenistic and Roman imperial periods, and of course a city that has endured down to the present day, the modern city of Alexandria in Egypt. The story of Alexandria

and its great significance in ancient history is fascinating. Of course, there was one of the seven wonders of the world there, the great lighthouse. You had the tomb of Alexander the Great. You might have also had the tomb of Cleopatra. But did you also know that today a significant portion of ancient Alexandria is underwater, in the eastern harbour of present-day Alexandria. In the past few decades, archaeologists have learned more about this sunken part of the ancient city, thanks to work done by institutions such as the Institut Européen d'Archéologie Submarine, the IEASM. Now the IEASM, in partnership with the Egyptian Ministry for Antiquities, they have planned, they have mapped, they have excavated a large part of the eastern

harbour floor and what they discovered was fascinating. They've discovered a treasure trove of artefacts, the outline of buildings dating to the Ptolemaic and Roman periods. And to talk about all of this archaeology in detail for the next 40 minutes or so, I was delighted to interview one of the leading underwater archaeologists, Fullstop. His name is Franck Goddio and he's been doing underwater archaeology in Egypt, in the eastern harbour of Alexandria, but also further east in Abu Kibbeh. He knows his stuff. He is the expert. So without further ado, to reveal all about Alexandria's underwater archaeology, here's Franck. Franck, it is wonderful to have you on the podcast today.

Yes, it's a pleasure, thank you. This is an awesome topic. You have the dream job, almost, underwater archaeology by yourself and your team. It's revealed so much about ancient Alexandria, about one of the most important cities of the ancient Mediterranean world. Yes, we are working now since nearly 30 years on the Portus Magnus of Alexandria. The Portus Magnus, which was the nevragic center of Alexandria in ancient times. Let's kick it all off with that. Ancient Alexandria, this great city of the ancient Mediterranean off the coast of modern-day Egypt. But what was the Portus Magnus? The Portus Magnus was most probably the first modern port ever created.

It was an instrument of power, wealth, and of course, it was also a kind of miracle for engineering port work. That port was huge when you think about other ports in the antiquity. Inside the port of Usmardu, there were several ports. Merchant ports, there were military ports, there were rural ports, there was the rural port of the galley. It was a kind of a universe by itself. It was a kind of a universe by itself. And you could divide it into two parts. The western part, which was called the Navalla, and which were mostly a shipyard and mission ports.

And the east part of the Portus Magnus, which was called the rural quarters. And there you had rural ports, but you had also a peninsula called the Poseidon with temples and villas. You had a rural island called Antirodos with a palace and a temple to Isis. And eastward of that, there was a Cape Roquias with all the palaces of the Ptolemy. And the image of that port was absolutely tremendous. This area of Alexandria in ancient times, as you say, it was a mini-universe. All of these different harbors and almost the most important part of the city, wasn't it, with the royal palaces of these Hellenistic Ptolemaic rulers, and then following that into Roman times too?

Absolutely. The royal part of Portus Magnus was a center of power for the Ptolemaic dynasty. And during Roman times, of course, the palaces were used by the high administration. There were a lot of changes in the portus magnus. But during 300 years, that port was a ruined port of the Mediterranean Sea. And Frank, just so we get a real idea of when in ancient history we're talking, if we're talking about the Ptolemaic rulers, so after Alexander the Great, but also the Romans. So are we talking around the turn of 2,000 years ago,

that kind of area? Yeah, it started in 330 BC. And of course, when the Ptolemaic dynasty failed, the Romans took over Egypt as a colony. And that port stayed. Very important for the Romans because it was from that port that all with the wheat and going toward Ostia, toward Rome. Well, it therefore begs the question, if it is this incredibly important port for the Ptolemies and then for the Roman Empire, why does this area of ancient Alexandria, the Portus Magnus, why does it fall?

Why does it sink beneath the waves? Yeah, it's a kind of a mystery, as a matter of fact. During the underwater excavation, the most recent finds were from the very early Islamic period. We found gold coins from the end of the 8th century AD. And then after, nothing. When you go into the text, you could see that in the 4th century AD, there has been a huge earthquake followed by a tidal wave in 365 AD, which destroyed part of the city of Alexandria. But nothing is said about the Portus Magnus. And during our excavation, we were surprised to find some very important monument,

which has been destroyed even during the first century AD. It looks that there has been several natural catastrophes, like earthquakes, tidal waves, which little by little sank the Portus Magnus. And we could analyze the phenomena, and in some areas we could prove that there has been an earthquake, followed by tidal wave, which triggered a phenomena called land liquefaction. And in a matter of a few seconds, or a few fractions of a second, monument collapsed and sank several meters down, up to six meters down in a fraction of a second.

What is very strange is that this has not mostly been recorded in available texts. Nowadays, available, maybe it has been recorded, but the texts were lost. What is absolutely certain is that under the water, you find the peninsula of the Poseidon. You find the island of Antiodos. On those, you could find sunken temples and sunken palaces, you know. so magnificent and important sanctuaries and buildings forgotten, which are today nearly in the middle of a city of 6 million inhabitants. And on this area of the East Port, which is absolutely not used today, except by a yacht club for small boats, and that's it.

And another port has developed west of Alexandria, which is the west port of Alexandria, which is today a very important commercial port. But the east port, which was the portus magnus of the antiquity, is now under the water, and the whole area is closed by two breakwaters to protect the city from the sway and the water. And the whole area is closed by two breakwater to protect the city from the sway and the wave. And you have this magnificent area there,

which is a new sport under this, is the Portus Magnus. Frank, you and your team have been working in the Portus Magnus, in this eastern port of Alexandria for more than 20 years now. You are the leading expert on it. I've got to take you back, though, to the very beginning. How did it all begin? I mean, talk me through up to that first dive when you went down beneath

the water in the eastern harbour and you started to see this amazing archaeology? Before even diving, we have done a long and huge work in order to gather all ancient texts, all ancient inscriptions concerning the Portus Magnus of Alexandria. Then we studied those and we historically interpreted those. Then we started to study everything which has been found around that on land, around that Portus Magnus, in order to have an idea of how much we could find underwater. Then, after having done that study,

we were absolutely convinced that a big part of the Portus Magnus was, of course, missing. Because on the ancient coast, we had some evidence that, for example, of obelisks, which one of them is now nearby the Thames in London. Another one is in Central Park in New York. in London, another one is in Central Park in New York, and those two obelisks, we have pictures of those, photos of those at the end of the 19th century, and they were nearly on the coast. And in ancient texts, it was obvious that those two obelisks were far away from the Portus Magnus. It was evident that a big part of the Portus Magnus

was lying underwater. Thus, after that, we started an electronic survey because diving in those waters, first you will see nothing except sediment because everything has been buried under meters of sediment. Thus, we started an electronic survey with nuclear resonance magnetometers. We have done the bathymetry.

That means we mapped the bottom of the Portus Magnus. And then we had strange evidence, you know, of what we called anomalies and magnetic anomalies. Then, at that time, we started to dive. But all this took more than four years before diving. Thus, we started to dive, and we were very excited because we had evident signals that something was going on underwater in some spot.

We dove there, and we saw nothing. Absolutely nothing. Flat bottom, sand, not very clean. And then we said, we have to start excavating. And we excavated a few centimeters, one meter, two meters, nothing. Sediment, sediment. And in the middle of the port, under two meters of sediment, it was a kind of a big coral, shapeless element, quite big.

And we looked at this, we excavated it. It was more or less 2.5 meters long, one meter wide, and it looks like a compression of coral. Nothing evident. Then we were suspicious about that because why finding something hard under so much meter of sediment? And it was an independent element. It was not a big rock, you know, it was by itself. pendant element. It was not a big rock, you know, it was by itself. Thus, with a pick,

we hit it and we saw that at 30 centimeters of soft concretion, there was something even harder in the middle. Thus, we started cleaning it and we saw a very nice granite block coming out of that. And little by little, cleaning it, we saw an inscription, hieroglyphic inscription. And we could read it was something unbelievable, life forever, in hieroglyph written on it. Thus, I thought it was a good omen and that we had to go on working. And after years and years, I can say now that this book was right in the middle of the whole island of Antirodos. And it was part of a palace which was there

and which has been seen three years after the death of Cleopatra VII, the great Cleopatra, by a geographer called Strabon, which mentions that on that spot was a palace used by the queen. Wow, so I mean, that's amazing. So let's focus on that first, that particular temple on that royal island of Antiroidos. So what is your work beneath the waves over the past couple of decades there revealed about how this royal palace used by the likes of Cleopatra looked? First, before walking on the monument, we walk years and years in order to define the topography of the contour of the Portus Magnus.

And in that particular case, we worked a lot defining the contour of Antirrhodos Island. Once we had that contour of the sunken island, we started to work on that submerged island. sunken island, we started to work on that submerged island. And we defined the contour of the palace. And also we could put into light a very important monument, which was a temple to Isis, which was not recorded by the text. And we could prove that there was a temple of Isis on that island, close to the palace. What is left from the palace? Nearly nothing.

The foundation, limestone foundation. It has been looted and looted most probably after several earthquakes, you know, and during Roman time, most probably it was no longer in use. time, most probably it was no longer in use. And we found on the place, on that place, bases of columns with Greek inscription, which told us that the Roman emperors put statues of themselves on that spot, fainting the city of Alexandria. So the Romans are almost, they are making their mark, saying the Ptolemaic rulers, they're gone. We are the new top dogs,

and we are placing our mark in these statues on this very important island. Absolutely. And some of those statues were statues of Caracalla, and we know from the text that Caracalla has done terrible things to the city of Alexandria and murdered tens of thousands of people in order to take revenge from jokes that Alexandrian people were doing about him.

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And look backwards to understand technologies that are still in progress. You know, when people turn around to me and say, oh, why would you want to live forever? Life's rubbish. I just think that's a bit sad. I think it's a worthwhile thing to do. And the thing that really makes it worthwhile is the fact that you could make it go on forever. So subscribe to Patented from history hit on apple spotify or wherever you get your podcasts to catch new episodes every wednesday and sunday whether you're in your running era pilates era or yoga era dive into peloton workouts that work with you from meditating at your kids Thank you. Find your push. Find your power. Peloton. Visit Peloton at onepeloton.ca. Frank, one other thing on that island, because you mentioned in passing there the Temple of Isis.

island because he mentioned in passing there the Temple of Isis. Now, if memory serves me correctly, in one of the sources talking about the tomb of Cleopatra, her tomb, monumental tomb, was near a Temple of Isis. I've got to ask, do you think it's potentially in that area that there might have been royal tombs like that of Cleopatra? We have no evidence of any tombs on that island for the time being. The texts concerning the museum of Cleopatra are very scarce. We have one from Pritak mentioning, yes, that the museum was a growth to a temple of Isis. From the text, I cannot say anything. And from what we have found and the water for the time being,

we found palaces, we found sanctuaries, but tombs we haven't found. Nearby the coast, nearby the place where used to stand the biggest temple of the antiquities, fabulous temple of the Caesar, the Caesareum. Yes, we found a lot of broken sarcophagus, but of course, not of royal type. Well, come on, Frank, you mentioned the temple of the Caesars there. What is this temple? It sounds like it was absolutely massive in ancient history. It has been described as the most beautiful temple of the antiquity, the richest one. The description we have of that temple, which was facing the Portus Magnus, is astonishing.

It had courts, gardens. astonishing. It had courts, gardens. On that spot were placed the two obelisks. One of them is now in London and the other one in New York. They have been donated by Egypt to UK and to the US at the end of the 19th century. We could walk in front of the place where once stood that temple. And we could see that most probably part of this temple has been swallowed also by the sea. Part of it is most probably under the modern city of Alexandria. And we have some proof that part of it is now under the portals of Magdouk. And we could even prove that some land work, preparation work, has been done in order to build that temple early first century BC.

It means that maybe the work to build the the project to build that huge temple, which has been built by, according to the text, Cleopatra herself, in honor of Julius Caesar, and then in honor of Antony, and then in honor of the Caesars, most probably has been planned by her father Ptolemy XII, because we have the absolute proof that preparation work has been done before the time of Cleopatra. Well, you mentioned there Ptolemy XII, so I would like to, if you wouldn't mind, to focus on a few of these Ptolemaic rulers before the famous Cleopatra now. Because in your work, Underwater Archaeology, in this eastern harbor, have you found any depictions, any busts of these Hellenistic Ptolemaic rulers? Very strange. We found a statue of a king, most probably Ptolemaic III. Oh, very early.

Made in marble, a little bit bigger than the eyesight, which once stood on Antirodus Island and fell during the earthquake and ended in a small royal port of Antirodus

Island. But otherwise, on land that we see, on the submerged land, we haven't found a portrait likeness of the Ptolemaic ruler, except on Antirodus Highland, where we found two well-preserved sphinxes, which fell also down the slope. And one of them is the likeness of Ptolemy XII. the slope, and one of them is the likeness of Ptolemy XII. And it was stood once at the temple of Isis on the rural island. But otherwise, most probably the Roman emperor cleaned most of the and brought them to Rome, because in Rome, there is a lot of things proceeding from Alexandria. Well, I would like to ask, therefore, about one particular statue which comes after Cleopatra,

and I believe, if I'm correct, is your favorite artifact that you've uncovered from beneath the waves of this harbor. Talk to me about this colossal statue, this face of the young Caesar. Yes. Just in front of the temple of the Caesar, we found a colossus head of Caesarean. Caesarean was the son of Julius Caesar and Cleopatra. And that head of Caesarean must have belonged to a statue which was more or less six meters high. Wow. And it bore, once upon a time, most probably a gold crown, which has disappeared, of course. And that statue was there, and you could see evidently

that the main statue has been cut and sliced into pieces, you know, in order to make some blocks, you know. And that statue must have belonged to the Caesarean. And it's very strange because it was, I would say, the likeness of the last pharaoh of Egypt. That must have been an absolutely amazing find to uncover, Frank. First, to see that colossal statue in the ground under the sea. And then I'm guessing it must have been a massive process to bring that up from the seabed, to bring it above the water. Yes.

Sometimes we are finding very small objects and sometimes we are finding a huge artifact and you need to bring a special crane in order to lift it, you know. And we found also columns bearing hieroglyphs proceeding from Memphis which has been brought there in order to be incorporated to the temple of the Caesars. But the weight of those could be five to six tons. Sometime on another spot nearby the peninsula of the Poseidon, we found the place where Antony built a sanctuary palace called the Timonium, the place where he wanted to retire from the life there and ask, as a matter of fact, Augustus the right to retire, but he had committed suicide before. And there we have to lift in order to excavate blocks weighing three to four tons.

Some concessions are massive and huge. Goodness. Well, fair play to you and the team who go through all that work to bring it up and these amazing artifacts, bring them really back to life. As we move on, I think we've talked a lot about these great busts, these temples, these places, particularly on the royal island of Antirodos. But I'd like to focus a bit more on the harbors themselves. You mentioned at the start how this, well, Eastern Harbor today was made up of lots of different harbors in ancient history. What do we know about the design and the function of these various harbors in ancient history. East of the Portus Magnus is a very beautiful harbor, nearly totally closed

by several dikes and breakwaters, which was called the Port of the Royal Galles. And this was the place where the Ptolemaic king had their royal galleys. Going west, you find a large military port where most probably Caesar anchored his fleet, which he had to burn during the war when he took over Alexandria. Then, after you have a large and very well protected port in the middle of the Portus Magnus, which is a merchant port called the Port of the Emporium. Then, going again in that port is the Royal Island of Antirodus with a special royal port, very well secured and closed. Then going west of Ozat, you find a large port which has been built by the Romans, which was not in use during the Ptolemaic time,

but the Romans built a huge breakwater with concrete blocks. Those concrete blocks are very amazing because they are 13 meters long, 6 meters wide, and 3 meters thick. And you have big mortar blocks like that forming a huge breakwater. And that breakwater was built just in front of the temple of the Caesar, the Caesareum, most probably during the time of Augustus, because that temple has been finished during the time of Augustus, and he took the opportunity to build in front of it a large port. Wow, so it shows the evolution of Alexandria down into Roman times.

Absolutely fascinating. I mean, keeping a bit more on these various ports, you mentioned these massive granite blocks, but should we also be thinking in our minds how these ports looked some 2,000 years ago? Were there lots of wooden jetties as well, which would have allowed lots of boats to pull up alongside? We don't have evidence of wooden jetties,

except on one part, which is very amazing. On Antirudos Island, we found wooden posts, but they are dating from before the Ptolemaic time. Oh, wow. So this is pre-Alexander. Pre-Alexander. All around the Portus Magnus, you have jetties beautifully made

with limestone blocks. Very well. And you have to look. You have an image. For example, on the end of each of the jetties, we have evidence that was columns, red granite columns. And sometimes you find some broken columns, capital and some broken part of statues.

All those jetis are the columns. We found hundreds of those red granite columns all over the Portus Magnus. You can even draw the contour of the Portus Magnus with the red granite columns which are left. And the vision of that Portus Magnus with all those columns, those statues you draw on the jetty, must have been very amazing during the antiquity. I've got to also ask about ships. Have you found any shipwrecks, any of these massive galleys that the sources talk about that these Ptolemaic rulers went absolutely mad for?

Do we have any evidence for ancient Ptolemaic or Roman ships in the harbour? We have evidence of Roman ships for sure, because we have excavated one of them fully. But very recently, we are using a new prototype of sub-bottom profile, which gives us in 3D what is buried under the sediment. And we could locate like that, but not proved yet. A lot of ancient shipwrecks that we have to still excavate. We have centuries of work ahead of us. Up to now, we haven't found evidence of those huge galleys described by ancient texts, but it doesn't mean that there is not, and we know where they could be.

Well, Frank, when you do get down to that layer, sign me up. I'm coming along. Because if you do find one of those massive ships, I definitely want to be there, my friend. I mean, it sounds so, so exciting for the future, therefore, of what plans you guys must have over the next few years, and indeed beyond that. Of course, these harbours, you mentioned that there was a military harbour, there was the Royal Harbour of the Ptolemies, but also this emporium, this trading harbour. And therefore, before we completely finish our interview, I wanted to rewind to Alexandria and this port as being this great trading hub of the Greco-Roman Mediterranean world. I'm sure you found so many artefacts, but I mean, if you could pick

a few, what sorts of items have been uncovered, whether they're really rich items or everyday items that really highlight how much of a bustling port place, how much this was a center of trade and connectivity? What sorts of artifacts have you uncovered from this port? When we excavate at the bottom of the harbors, for example, at the bottom of the central harbor of the Emporium, you have stratigraphy of a three-meter broken ceramic, or sometimes intact ceramic, close to the dike. And from that, you can, of course, study and define the use of each of the ports and the use of each part of a specific port. That jetty was used for that type of, etc. The work to be done there is huge, huge,

when you consider the absolutely very thick and impressive stratigraphy. We can take pictures and you see the diver, very small compared to the cut of the stratigraphy that we have to study. And you can go down and down and down under the sediment. and down under the sediment. On the Royal Port, we went up to 5.5 meters thick of stratigraphy, and we didn't get to the bottom yet. It's a huge walk. On the submerged land, the sanctuary, you can find jewelry, very important jewelry.

You find on the coast daily life objects. Of course, the rural islands are much richer in terms of quality of ceramics. On the rural island of Antirodos, we found luxury imported ceramics from Italy, from Greece, from all the parts of the world, and glass, very precious glass and precious artefacts also. Frank, this has just been a glimpse kind of into the amazing work that you and your team have done here over the past 20, 25 years. But it also sounds, from what you've been saying there, how much is still uncovered, that there's still so much more to do. What's next in the underwater archaeology story of this East Harbour, of the Portus Magnus?

We will go there next by May for a new mission, and we will work specifically on the site of the Tiberium, of the Thibonium, built by Anthony, and on the site of the Temple of Isis of Antirodo Saland. And we will excavate also a new shipwreck that we have found on the Royal Port of Antirodo. We have a lot of work for this year's mission, but when you see the path of our excavation and the work to be done you can assume that we need several centuries to end the job frank it's all absolutely extraordinary i need to go and renew my underwater my scuba diving license absolutely for this sign me up whenever it comes along it just goes for me to say, Frank, it's been a pleasure.

And thank you so much for taking the time to come on the podcast today. It was a pleasure. Thank you. Well, there you go. There was Franck Goddio to talk all about Alexandria's incredible underwater archaeology in its eastern harbour. archaeology in its eastern harbour, the archaeology they've discovered in artefacts, but also the layout of these more than 2,000 year old buildings and harbours and so on. It's amazing. It is amazing. And they are going back this year and in future years, they'll be uncovering more. And I can't wait to hear what they'll be finding next. So I hope you enjoyed the episode. Last things from me, you know what I'm going to say. If you're enjoying the ancients, if you enjoyed this episode and want to help us out,

well you know what you can do. You can leave us a lovely rating on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts from. It greatly helps us as we continue to share these wonderful stories from our distant past with you and with as many people as possible. But that's enough from me, and I'll see you in the next episode. Whether you're in your running era, Pilates era, or yoga era, dive into Peloton workouts that work with you. From meditating at your kid's game to mastering a strength program, they've got everything you need to keep knocking down your goals. No pressure to be who you're not.

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