Ismaïlia

Ismailia 

is a city in north-east Egypt. Known in Egypt as "The City of Beauty and Enchantment".

 Ismaïlia is situated on the west bank of the Suez Canal, it is the capital of the Ismailia Governorate

The city has a population (including surrounding rural areas) of approximately 750,000 inhabitants

It is located approximately half way between Port Said to the north and Suez to the south

The Canal widens at that point to include Lake Timsah, one of the Bitter Lakes linked by the Canal.

Ismaïlia was founded in 1863, during the construction of the Suez Canal, by Khedive Ismail the Magnificent, after whom the city is named. 

The head office of the Suez Canal Authority is located in Ismaïlia at the shore of Lake Timsah. It still has a large number of buildings dating from British and French involvement with the Canal. Most of these buildings are still used by Canal employees and officials.

Port Said

Port Said 
is a city that lies in north east of Egypt, extending about 30 kilometres (19 mi) along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea , north of the Suez Canal.

The city was established in 1859 during the building of the suez canal. The economic base of the city is Fishing and some industrie ssuch as chemicals and processed food . Port Said is also an important harbour for exports of Egyptian products like Cotton and Rice, also a fueling station for ships that pass through the Suez Canal. It is a Duty-Free port as well as a tourist resort especially during summer.

Port Said's twin city is Port Fouad , which lies on the eastern bank of the canal.

The cities are connected by free ferries running all through the day , and together they form a metropolitan area with over a million residents that extends both on the African and the Asian sides of the Suez Canal.

The name of Port Said first appeared in 1855, It was chosen by an International committee composed of England, France, Russia, Austria, Spain and Piedmont.

It is a compound name which composed of two parts: Port (marine harbour) and Said (the name of the ruler of Egypt at that time), who granted Ferdinand de Lesseps the concession to dig the Suez Canal.

Library of Alexandria

The Royal Library of Alexandria in Egypt  was the largest and most significant great library of the Ancient World. It flourished under the patronage of the Ptolemaic Dynasty and functioned as a major center of scholarship from its construction in the 3rd century BC until the Roman conquest of Egypt in 30 BC.

The library was conceived and opened either during the reign of Ptolemy I Soter (323–283 BC) or during the reign of his son Ptolemy II (283–246 BC)

Plutarch (AD 46–120) wrote that during his visit to Alexandria in 48 BC Julius Caesar accidentally burned the library down when he set fire to his own ships to frustrate Achillas' attempt to limit his ability to communicate by sea. After its destruction, scholars used a "daughter library" in a temple known as the Serapeum, located in another part of the city. Intended both as a commemoration and an emulation of the original, the Bibliotheca Alexandrina was inaugurated in 2002 near the site of the old library

In 2004, a Polish-Egyptian excavation team announced that they had discovered the remains of the Library of Alexandria

  

Pompey's Pillar Alexandria

Pompey's Pillar is a Roman triumphal column in Alexandria, Egypt, and the largest of its type constructed outside of the imperial capitals of Rome and Constantinople

The only known free-standing column in Roman Egypt which was not composed of drums, it is one of the largest ancient monoliths and one of the largest monolithic columns ever erected.

The monolithic column shaft measures 20.46 m in height with a diameter of 2.71 m at its base

 The weight of the single piece of red Aswan granite is estimated at 285 tons. The column is 26.85 m high including its base and capital.^[2] Other authors give slightly deviating dimensions.

Erroneously dated to the time of Pompey, the Corinthian column was actually built in 297 AD, commemorating the victory of Roman emperor Diocletian over an Alexandrinian revolt

Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa

The Catacombe of Kom el Shoqafa is a historical archaeological site located in Alexandria , Egypt, and is considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Middle Ages.

The necropolis consists of a series of Alexandrian tombs, statues and archaeological objects of the Pharaonic funeral cult with Hellenistic and early Imperial Roman influences. Due to the time period, many of the features of the Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa merge Roman, Greek and Egyptian cultural points; some statues are Egyptian in style, yet bear Roman clothes and hair style whilst other features share a similar style. A circular staircase, which was often used to transport deceased bodies down the middle of it, leads down into the tombs that were tunneled into the bedrock during the age of the Antonine emperors (2nd century AD). The facility was then used as a burial chamber from the 2nd century to the 4th century, before being rediscovered in 1900 when a donkey accidentally fell into the access shaft. To date, three sarcophagi have been found, along with other human and animal remains which were added later. It is believed that the catacombs were only intended for a single family, but it is unclear why the site was expanded in order to house numerous other individuals. The Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa is, according to some lists, also one of the seven medieval wonders of the world. One of the more gruesome features of the catacombs is the so called Hall of Caracalla. According to tradition, this is a mass burial chamber for the humans and animals massacred by order of the Emperor Caracalla

Lighthouse of Alexandria

The Lighthouse of Alexandria, also known as the Pharos of Alexandria ( in Ancient Greek),

was a tower built between 280 and 247 BC on the island of Pharos at Alexandria, Egypt. Its purpose was to guide sailors into the harbour at night.

With a height variously estimated at somewhere between 393 and 450 ft , it was for many centuries among the tallest man-made structures on Earth. It was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

Pharos was a small island just off the coast of Alexandria. It was supposedly inhabited by people who would destroy any ship that was wrecked off of its coast. To deter this problem, Ptolemy I had the lighthouse built. It was linked to the mainland by a man-made connection named the Heptastadion, which thus formed one side of the city's harbour. The tower erected there guided mariners at night, through its fire, as well as being a landmark by day. The lighthouse was completed in the 3rd century BC. After Alexander the Great died , Ptolemy Soter announced himself king in 305 BC, and commissioned its construction shortly thereafter. The building was finished during his son Ptolemy Philadelphos's reign. Strabo reported that Sostratus had a dedication inscribed in metal letters to the Saviour Gods.
 Constructed from large blocks of light-coloured  stone, the tower was made up of three stages: a lower square section with a central core, a middle octagonal section, and, at the top, a circular section. At its apex was positioned a mirror which reflected sunlight during the day; a fire was lit at night.
Extant Roman coins struck by the Alexandrian mint show that a statue of a triton was positioned on each of the building's four corners . A statue of Poseidon stood atop the tower during the Roman period.
 After the Muslims took over all of Egypt, the top of the Pharos supposedly became a mosque, as the beacon was no longer in working order. The Pharos remained this way until its destruction in the 14th century.
The lighthouse was badly damaged in the earthquake of 956, then again in 1303 and 1323. The two earthquakes in 1303 and 1323 damaged the lighthouse to the extent that the Arab traveler Ibn Battuta reported no longer being able to enter the ruin. Even the stubby remnant disappeared in 1480, when the then-Sultan of Egypt, Qaitbay, built a mediæval fort on the former location of the building using some of the fallen stone.

Alexandria

Alexandria 
known as the ( Pearl of the Mediterranean ) , was founded by Alexander the Great in 332BC as the capital for his Egyptian Kingdom.
It is the second-largest city of Egypt , extending about 32 km (20 mi) along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea  in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving approximately 80% of Egypt's imports and exports.

Alexandria is also an important tourist resort . It is home to the Bibliotheca Alexandria.

It is an important industrial centre because of its natural gas and oil pipelines from Suez.

It remained Egypt's capital for nearly a thousand years, until the Muslim conquest of Egypt in 
AD 641, when a new capital was founded at Fustat.

 
Alexandria 
was known because of its Lighthouse of Alexandria , one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. ,its library (the largest library in the ancient world); and the Catacombs of Kom el Shoqafa. . Ongoing maritime archaeology in the harbor of Alexandria, which began in 1994, is revealing details of Alexandria both before the arrival of Alexander, when a city named Rhacotis existed there, and during thePtolemaic Dynasty.

   

Modern city 
Districts

Modern Alexandria is divided into six districts:

• al-Montaza District
• Sharak (Eastern Alexandria District
• Wassat (Central Alexandria) District
• al-Amriya District
• Agamy (Western Alexandria) District:
• al-Gomrok District

There are also two cities under the jurisdiction of the Alexandria governorate forming metropolitan Alexandria:

• Borg Al-Arab city
• New Borg Al-Arab city