My father was upset about the library being burned. He tried to be stoic but I could tell he
loathed the destruction of knowledge it represented. I was at primary school and fancied myself as an amateur
detective. My main suspect was William
McCartney, a boy in my class. The
evidence was circumstantial but clear.
I had discovered him defacing a library book at school. He had drawn two huge breasts on the cover
of a book on Cookery. Instead of a
prim, apron clad April Summers displaying cakes in each hand, William had
constructed huge breasts incorporating the cherries on top of the cakes as
nipples. I was convinced such vandalism
spoke of his disrespect for the written word.
In our household books were everything and everywhere. We devoured them like bread and water and whether it was by Henry Miller, the collected plays of Shaw, or Steinbeck we consumed them and then hunted for new fodder. No folding down corners or scuffing the cover and no underlining of texts or notes in the margins. Books had to be respected like people. Even the crappy ones. So Ms Summers added breasts offended my sensibilities. William’s violent tendencies were shown clearly when he brought to school a black bin liner full of dead birds he had shot with his own air rifle. When the American Constitution stipulates the right to carry arms, they must never have had classmates like mine. I could honestly say I wouldn’t have trusted any of them with a firearm. So there you have it. William was violent (bag of birds – exhibit one) and he took pleasure from the defacement of literature (cookery book – exhibit two). That made him in my mind a strong candidate for the burning of the library. For a whole year I seethed with resentment towards William and blamed him for the book, the birds, the library and for bringing sadness to my father’s heart.
In our household books were everything and everywhere. We devoured them like bread and water and whether it was by Henry Miller, the collected plays of Shaw, or Steinbeck we consumed them and then hunted for new fodder. No folding down corners or scuffing the cover and no underlining of texts or notes in the margins. Books had to be respected like people. Even the crappy ones. So Ms Summers added breasts offended my sensibilities. William’s violent tendencies were shown clearly when he brought to school a black bin liner full of dead birds he had shot with his own air rifle. When the American Constitution stipulates the right to carry arms, they must never have had classmates like mine. I could honestly say I wouldn’t have trusted any of them with a firearm. So there you have it. William was violent (bag of birds – exhibit one) and he took pleasure from the defacement of literature (cookery book – exhibit two). That made him in my mind a strong candidate for the burning of the library. For a whole year I seethed with resentment towards William and blamed him for the book, the birds, the library and for bringing sadness to my father’s heart.
It came as something of a shock to discover later that my
father was referring to the burning of the Great Library in Alexandria which
happened around two thousand years ago.
A crime William, however vile, could not have committed. Through the following years my father
continued to mourn the loss of this great library and filled in the details of
this catastrophe.
When Alexander the Great died in 323 BC his kingdom was divided up into three pieces: Antigonids ruled Greece, Seleucids ruled Asia Minor, Syria and Mesoptamia while Ptolemis ruled Egypt. Wanting to gain supremacy and legitimacy Ptolemy stole Alexander’s body and took it first to Memphis and then to Alexandria. This was a blatant attempt to create a political and dynastic link with Alexander the Great. Creating a museum “Temple of the Muses” was also a part of this goal. After all, Aristotle who had taught Alexander, had a wonderful library and so Ptolemy and his line created the greatest library of the ancient world. It was their intention to collect all the books in the world and works from India, Persia, Babylonia, Georgia, Armenia and far a field were gathered. The works of poets, philosophers, historians etc were carefully obtained and kept in the library.
When Alexander the Great died in 323 BC his kingdom was divided up into three pieces: Antigonids ruled Greece, Seleucids ruled Asia Minor, Syria and Mesoptamia while Ptolemis ruled Egypt. Wanting to gain supremacy and legitimacy Ptolemy stole Alexander’s body and took it first to Memphis and then to Alexandria. This was a blatant attempt to create a political and dynastic link with Alexander the Great. Creating a museum “Temple of the Muses” was also a part of this goal. After all, Aristotle who had taught Alexander, had a wonderful library and so Ptolemy and his line created the greatest library of the ancient world. It was their intention to collect all the books in the world and works from India, Persia, Babylonia, Georgia, Armenia and far a field were gathered. The works of poets, philosophers, historians etc were carefully obtained and kept in the library.
There was a copy of
Epidemics belonging to the physician Mnemon of Side, ancient scrolls and books
from all over found their way to the library at Alexandria. Even when a ship entered the port it was
searched and if books or scrolls were found these were seized and copied. The copies were returned but the originals
were stored in the library. The
greatest fruits of human endeavour flowed to Alexandria and were collected and
collated. The arts and sciences were represented and
so many were not only original but unique and priceless. The fame of the Great Library of Alexandria
spread far and wide. It was an
incredible search for knowledge all carefully gathered from the four corner of
the earth.
So what happened?
Well, as one has probably suspected by now, some idiot burned the
library down. After centuries of
careful collection and cataloguing the works of great minds it took small minds
a few days to dispose of the Great Library.
The disaster was of epic proportions.
We don’t know, even now, the scale of the loss. But there are hints. Callimachus, a poet and scholar, had created
a catalogue/biography of the contents of the library called Pinakes. We only have a tiny portion of this Pinakes
(table of contents) left but there is enough to make you howl in despair at what
went up in flames.
Now, I understood
why my father took the burning of the Great Library in Alexandria so
personally. So should we all! But on further reflection I didn’t feel so
bad about blaming William McCartney for the crime. It turns out blaming those we dislike for despicable crimes they
have not done is a theme common in history. For example, Caliph Umar was blamed for the burning of
the library and there is even a nice little tale told to explain why. , "If these writing of the Greeks agree with the book of God, they
are useless and need not be preserved; if they disagree, they are pernicious
and ought to be destroyed". It was, the story continues, thereupon,
decided that the books were contrary to the Quran and the whole library was
burned down without even opening the books.
Totally rubbish of course, the Great Library was lost much earlier
probably in 47/48 AD perhaps by Julius Caesar who was burning ships around that
time in the harbour. Mohammad and the
Quran did not appear for another five centuries and so Caliph Umar is in the
clear. There was another library in
Alexandria called the Serapeum (daughter library) but this was burned down in
391 AD under the decree of Archbishop Theophilus. Edward Gibbon (writer
of the The History
of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire) described Archbishop
Theophilus as "...the perpetual enemy of peace and virtue, a bold, bad
man, whose hands were alternately polluted with gold and with blood." Not
a great way to be remembered in the history books.
But some people really do say and do such stupid things that they need
to be remembered for posterity. Like
Pope Gregory’s famous line "Ignorance is the mother of piety." Following this
principle to the letter, Gregory burned the precious Palestine Library founded
by Emperor Augustus, destroyed the greater part of the writings of Livy and
forbade the study of the classics. The Crusaders destroyed the splendid library
of Tripoli and reduced to ashes many of the glorious centres of Saracenic art
and culture. Ferdinand and Isabella put to flames all the Muslim and Jewish
works they could find in Spain.
Library burning has not gone
out of fashion. The library of Leuven, Belgium
was burned in 1914 and then after being rebuilt was burned to the ground once
more in May in 1940 by the Nazis. In
case you think this fetish for library burning has run out of steam one need
only look at the American invasion of Iraq in 2003 when the National Library of
Baghdad was burned and priceless ancient antiquities and manuscripts were
lost.
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