[Aetius]

Its just sort of depressing how much of the ancient world has been lost to looting, natural disasters, amd the type of fires that wiped out the Alexandrian library.

[night reader]

Its just sort of depressing how much of the ancient world has been lost to looting, natural disasters, and the type of fires that wiped out the Alexandrian library.

Just makes the little which does survive that much more interesting, exotic, and unfortunately, valuable (thus inviting more looting.)

[SunkenCiv]

Fascinating history of the library. Notes that the library was *not* burned by Julius Caesar, and in fact was around during Roman times, and was finally consigned to the flames by the Moslems:

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The Vanished Library by Luciano Canfora tr by Martin Ryle

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