Canal of The Pharaohs - Greek, Roman and Islamic Works

Greek, Roman and Islamic Works

Ptolemy II was the first to solve the problem of keeping the Nile free of salt water when his engineers invented the water lock around 274/273 BC.

In the 2nd century AD, Ptolemy the Astronomer mentions a "River of Trajan", a Roman canal running from the Nile to the Red Sea.

A stela (one of four commemorating the construction of a canal linking the Nile with the Red Sea by Darius I) was located at the Wadi Tumilat and probably recorded sections of Darius's canal.

Islamic texts also discuss the canal, which they say had been silted up by the seventh century but reopened in 641 or 642 AD by Amr ibn al Aas, the conqueror of Egypt and was in use until closed in 767 AD in order to stop supplies reaching Mecca and Medina which were in rebellion.

Thereafter, the land routes to tranship camel caravans' goods were from Alexandria to ports on the Red Sea or the northern Byzantine silk route through the Caucasian Mountains transhipping on the Caspian Sea and thence to India.

During his Egyptian expedition, Napoleon found the canal in 1799.