Celsus library: Did you mean...?

Ptolemy II Philadelphus ("The Sibling Loving", r. 282-246 BCE) was the second ruler of the Ptolemaic Dynasty. He consolidated the kingdom conquered by his father Ptolemy I and presided over its golden age. Ptolemy II invested...

Abbeys were a striking feature of medieval urban and rural landscapes. Their layout and architecture reflected their purpose as cut-off monastic retreats which, conversely, also served and inspired their local communities...

The Christian doctrine of the Trinity (from the Latin trinus, meaning "threefold") professes that there is one God, but three eternal and consubstantial persons (aspects): the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Father is the God...

Hypatia of Alexandria (c. 370 - March 415) was a female philosopher and mathematician, born in Alexandria, Egypt possibly in 370 (although some scholars cite her birth as c. 350). Little is known of her life but her dramatic...

In ancient Greek medicine illness was initially regarded as a divine punishment and healing as, quite literally, a gift from the gods. However, by the 5th century BCE, there were attempts to identify the material causes for...

Seshat (also given as Sefkhet-Abwy and Seshet) is the Egyptian goddess of the written word. Her name literally means "female scribe" and she is regularly depicted as a woman wearing a leopard skin draped over her robe with a headdress...

Hippocrates was born on the Greek island of Kos in the 5th century BCE, and he became the most famous physician in antiquity. He established a medical school on the island, wrote many treatises on medical matters, and is, through...

Leo Africanus (al-Hasan ibn Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Wazzan al-Fasi al-Granati, 1485-1554) was a diplomat, merchant traveller and scholar who famously voyaged from Timbuktu to the Niger River and wrote 'The Description of Africa' (La...

The Romans assimilated earlier Greek science for their own purposes, evaluating and then accepting or rejecting that which was most useful, much as they did in other fields such as warfare, art, and theatre. This assimilation of...

Did you know that the prototype of a library’s card catalog was invented over 2000 years ago by Callimachus of Cyrene? This video is all about the great scholar and poet Callimachus of Cyrene who revolutionized...