Probably to the Emperor Diocletian, about A.D. 297. There is a four line Greek inscription to him on the granite base on the western side, about 10 feet up. It is illegible and indeed invisible from the ground. Generations of scholars have worked at it with the following result:—
“To the most just Emperor, the tutelary God of Alexandria, Diocletian the invincible: Postumus, prefect of Egypt.”
The formidable Emperor (p. [46]) had crushed a rebellion here and was a god to be propitiated; the pillar, erected in the precincts of Serapis, would celebrate his power and clemency and presumably bore his statue on the top.—There is another theory: that the column was dedicated after the triumph of the Christians in 391 and glorifies the new religion; if this is so it must itself have previously been pagan, for by this date the Alexandrians had not the means or the power to erect a new monument of such a size.
(ii). The Temple of Serapis. West of the Pillar, reached by a staircase, are long subterranean galleries, excavated in the rock and lined with limestone. These were probably part of the Serapeum—basements of some sort—and enthusiastic visitors have even identified them with the library where the books were kept; in them are some small semi-circular niches of unknown use. Some marble columns stand on the ground above.—South of the Pillar, near the Sphinxes, are more passages, lined with cement; these too may have been part of the temple. All is conjectural, and the plan of the Serapeum, as we gather it from classical writers, can in no way be fitted in with existing remains. According to them, it was rectangular, and stood in the middle of a cloister, with each of whose sides it was connected by a cross-colonnade. The temple consisted of a great hall and an inner shrine. The architecture was probably Greek; certainly the statue was—made of blue-black marble (p. [19]), the work of Bryaxis.
(iii). The Temple of Isis. Isis, wife of Osiris, was equally united to his successor Serapis, and had in Ptolemaic times her temple on the plateau. North of the Pillar are some excavations that have been identified with it.
(iv). Two Sphinxes. Found in the enclosure and set up south of the Pillar. Of Assouan granite.
(v). Fragments of a Frieze. These, magnificently worked in granite, lie on the slope east of the Pillar; we pass them on the way up. Date:—about 1st cent. A.D. They may have belonged to the great entrance gate of the temple enclosure. He who meditates on them for a little may recapture some idea of the shrine. Note the Pillar itself so suggests vanished glory and solidity.
This concludes the remains. They are disappointing for so famous a site, but there is one satisfaction: this is the actual spot. Long in doubt, it has been identified by the statues and inscriptions that have been found here; they are now in the Museum; see Rooms 6, 12, and 16.
Just beyond the enclosure of Pompey’s Pillar we leave the tram route and turn to the right, reaching in ten minutes the Kom es Chogafa Catacombs.