Philo's Alexandria

Dorothy I. Sly

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780415096799
• eBook ISBN: 9781134681174
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Ancient History
• Index: History

First-century Alexandria vied with Rome to be the greatest city of the Roman empire. More than half a million people lived in its cosmopolitan four square miles. It was a major centre for international trade and shipping. Little remains of Alexandria's golden age. Few papyrus records of the city survive. Archaeologists' attempts to reveal its past have been frustrated by years of subsidence, earthquakes and continuous demolition and rebuilding. Our main guide to the city is Philo, an Alexandrian Jew, who, sometimes inadvertantly, incorporated information about his home city into his copious religious writings. In this compelling new study, Dorothy I. Sly searches through Philo's treatises for information about Alexandria. By recognising his shortcomings and prejudices, and questioning his judgements, she builds up an authentic picture of life in the first century.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1. ‘A Man Eminent on All Accounts’
• 2. ‘Founded to Satisfy the Soaring Ambition of Some King’
• 3. ‘Hope of Safety to the Voyager’
• 4. The ‘Magnanimity’ of Ptolemy II Philadelphus
• 5. ‘Amours and Adulteries and the Deceits of Women’
• 6. ‘In the Midst of the Marketplace’
• 7. ‘Wholesale Deprivation of All that is Noble’
• 8. ‘Schools of Prudence and Courage and Temperance and Justice’
• 9. ‘An Art of Healing that Treats the Soul’
• 10. ‘Superintendence in Sickness and Health’
• 11. ‘In a City not their Own’
• Bibliography
• Index of Philonic Treatises and Passages Cited
• Index of Other Ancient Authors and Works Cited
• Index Of Modern Authors and Works Cited
• General Index