Left from Boulevard, at end of Rue Averoff, is the church of the Armenian Catholics (p. [213]).
Right from Boulevard, in Rue de l’Eglise Copte, is the Cathedral of the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate (p. [212]) dedicated to St. Mark. Those who have never seen a Coptic Church should look in. It is fatuously ugly. On the screen that divides nave from sanctuary are several pictures—among them St. Damiana with her wheel; she is the native Egyptian Saint who was probably the origin of St. Catherine of Alexandria: round her are the forty maidens who shared her martyrdom. In the sanctuary are some pictures of St. Mark, whose primitive church is wrongly supposed to have stood on this site (p. [46]); he is shown writing his Gospel or standing between Cleopatra’s Needle and Pompey’s Pillar. Outside the Church are the Schools, ineptly adorned with a Lion of St. Mark of the Venetian type.
Right from Boulevard, the Rue Nebi Daniel leads past the chief Jewish Synagogue to the Rue Rosette (Section I).
The Boulevard reaches the tram terminus. To the right is the road to Nouzha (Section IV), to the left the sea and the New Quays (Section II).
On this featureless spot once arose a stupendous temple, the Caesareum, and a pair of obelisks, Cleopatra’s Needles.
(i). History of the Caesareum.—Cleopatra began it in honour of Antony (p. [26]). After their suicide Octavian finished it in honour of himself. (B.C. 13). He was worshipped there as Caesar Augustus, and the temple remained an imperial possession until Christian times. Constantius II (A.D. 354) intended to present it to the Church, but before the transference could be effected St. Athanasius, who was always energetic, had held an Easter Service inside it. The Emperor was offended. Two years later his troops nearly killed Athanasius inside the building, and gave it to the Arians. Arians and Orthodox continued to fight for and in it and smashed it to pieces. (p. [49]). Athanasius, just back from his final exile, built on the ruins a church which was dedicated to St. Michael but usually retained the famous title Caesareum. It became the Cathedral of Alexandria, superseding St. Theonas (p. [189]). Here in 416 Hypatia was torn to pieces by tiles (p. [51]). Here in 640 the Patriarch Cyrus held a solemn service before betraying the city to the Arabs (p. [55]). Date of final destruction—912.
(ii). Appearance. Nothing is known of the architecture of the temple, but the Jewish philosopher Philo (p. [63]) thus writes of it in the day of its glory:
“It is a piece incomparably above all others. It stands by a most commodious harbour: wonderful high and large in proportion; an eminent sea-mark: full of choice paintings and statues with donatives and oblatives in abundance; and then it is beautiful all over with gold and silver; the model curious and regular in the disposition of the parts, as galleries, libraries, porches, courts, halls, walks, and consecrated groves, as glorious as expense and art could make them, and everything in the proper place; besides that, the hope and comfort of seafaring men, either coming in or going out.”
(iii). The Obelisks. In front of the Caesareum (between present tram terminus and sea) stood “Cleopatra’s Needles” of which one is now in the Central Park, New York, and the other on the Embankment, London, They had nothing to do with Cleopatra till after her death. They were cut in the granite quarries of Assouan for Thothmes III (B.C. 1500), and set up by him at Heliopolis near Cairo, before the temple of the Rising Sun. In B.C. 13 they were transferred here by the engineer Pontius. They rested not directly on their bases but each on four huge metal crabs, one of which has been recovered. Statues of Hermes or of Victory tipped them. In the Arab period, when all around decayed, they became the chief marvel of the city. One fell. They remained in situ until the 19th cent., when they were parted and took their last journey, the fallen one to England in 1877, the other to the United States two years later.