monument · c. 280 BCE–1323 CE

The Pharos

Φάρος

Known · AttestedExistence: AttestedKnown · ExcavatedLocation: ExcavatedKnown · AttestedForm: Attested

The lighthouse on the tip of Pharos island, a many-storeyed tower of white stone dedicated by Sostratus of Cnidus "for the safety of sailors", finished in the 280s BCE. Medieval Arabic witnesses describe three stages, square, octagonal and round; modern estimates of its height run from about 100 to 130 m. Ruined by the earthquakes of 1303 and 1323, it was replaced by the fort of Qaitbay in 1477–79.

The evidence: Strabo, Pliny and Posidippus's dedication epigram; Roman coins show it; Ibn al-Shaykh measured it in 1165/66. Thousands of its blocks and statues have been mapped off Qaitbay since 1994. The story that Sostratus hid his name under the king's plaster is Lucian's anecdote; the mirror that burned ships is medieval legend.

Within Alexandria.

Pharos
On the plan of the city, in its own line: solid where the position is known, dashed where it is conjectured.

This place through time

  1. c. 280 BCE–1323 CE · Its years, as the sources give them.
  2. c. 280s BCE · The Pharos completed Known: attested
  3. c. 280–250 BCE · The Torah translated into Greek Known: probable
  4. 1303 and 1323 CE · Earthquakes ruin the Pharos Known: attested
  5. 1349 CE · Ibn Battuta cannot enter the tower Known: attested
  6. 1477–1479 CE · Qaitbay builds his fort from the tower's stone Known: attested
  7. 1992 and 1994 CE · The drowned harbour and the tower's stones mapped Known: excavated

In the show

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