The Corrupting Sea: A Study of Mediterranean History

of connection between their topics and the library at Alexandria, but the treatments vary from specialized, scholarly approaches to such topics as the survival of Aristotle’s writings or the theater at Paphos in Cyprus, to broader surveys of the city of Alexandria or the development of mystery religions. In his introduction, MacLeod outlines the sometimes mythical history of the library, from Alexander the Great’s order that it should be built to the various occasions when all or parts of its holdings are said to have been destroyed. D. T. Potts argues that the concept of a library began when people in the ancient Near East stored cuneiform tablets so they could retrieve information quickly. Although the Assyrian King Assurbanipal’s library is the most famous, it was not the fvst important Near Eastern library, but rather was itself assembled from earlier private and royal collections. Wendy Brazil offers a descriptive tour of ancient Alexandria, and Robert Barnes reexamines the history of the library, arguing that it was destroyed in 272, not by the Arabs in 642. The complex history of the survival of the Aristotelian corpus is analyzed by R. G. Tanner. In an effort to show that their research was as scholarly as that of the philologists at Alexandria, medical writers began to rely on the Hippocratic texts rather than emphasizing their own scientific observations. As a result, according to John Vallance, although the city acquired a reputation as a center for medical research, Alexandrian scholarship in fact impeded the advance of medical studies. J. R. Green sees Alexandrian influences in the architecture of the theater at Paphos in Cyprus and suggests that Alexandrian theaters influenced the development of Roman theater architecture. Samuel N. C. Lieu surveys “Scholars and Students in the Roman East,” Patricia Johnson outlines the development of mystery religions from Orphism to early modem Europe, and J. 0. Ward points out that the library in Umberto ko ’ s Name of the Rose was larger, and its contents more classical, than those of any historical medieval library. Although the reader looking for a systematic account of the Alexandrian library and its role will not find it here, the essays are often stimulating and sufficiently varied to offer something of interest to students at almost every level.