Alexandria was a wealthy and multinational city where the Greeks had a lot to say as well as the Egyptians. It was also home to the largest Jewish colony outside the land of Israel.
In ancient and medieval times, Alexandria was a centre of cultural life, its importance being given by some of the greatest centres of learning of the time: the Musaeon - the Temple of the Muses, which housed the treasures of Greek literature, cared for by scholars who sought to preserve them for future generations, and the Great Library of Alexandria, which was part of it. The library attracted the greatest figures in the world of scholarship at the time - its collection could hold some 700,000 rolls of papyrus, an impressive number for the time.
Within the city there was also the island of Pharos, on which there was a lighthouse that is now considered to be one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
