Greek Bottles
(In the Museum of Napoleon III)
CHAPTER LXVI. THE KINGDOM OF THE PTOLEMIES
[323-321 B.C.]
When the empire of Alexander was parcelled out among his generals, the most desirable lot perhaps was that which fell to the share of Ptolemy. That astute general chose Egypt for his portion, and despite the efforts of his rivals, he was able, thanks in part to the isolated geographical position, to retain it, and ultimately to become its recognised sovereign and the founder of a dynasty of kings which was to hold unbroken sway there for the long period of three hundred years.
Ptolemy, besides being an excellent general, was evidently a man of rather wide culture and varied attainments. His capacities have been sometimes accounted for by the suggestion that he was probably in fact the half-brother of Alexander the Great, as his mother had been a concubine of Philip; though his royal paternity, if indeed a fact, was never officially recognised. Be that as it may, Ptolemy was a man of great ability as a ruler, and his general culture is evidenced by the fact that he wrote a history of the life and campaigns of Alexander, which work, as we have already seen, was one of the two chief sources from which the history of Arrian was compiled.
The first Ptolemy founded, and his successors enlarged and extended, the famous Alexandrian library, which came to be by far the most important collection of books that had probably been gathered together anywhere in the world up to that time, comprising, it is said, no fewer than half a million manuscripts. In connection with the library was an institution which was virtually a college, where the most distinguished scholars of the day studied and taught. The language and the entire official life thus transplanted into Old Egypt were of course Grecian. All official connection with the mother country was soon utterly broken; the kingdom of the Ptolemies, as a political factor, was a thing quite apart; but in the broader sense the new Egyptian power was essentially Greek. Alexandria, the new Athens, became the centre of Greek life, thought, and influence; it was there, rather than to Athens itself, that the youth flocked from the provinces to drink at that fount of Grecian culture which still maintained its influence in the world for generations after the original Hellas had been shattered in power and shorn of all political significance.