Suez Canal

THE SUEZ CANAL


There seems to have always been an interest in linking the Mediterranean and Red Seas.   Most of the early efforts were directed towards a link from the Nile to the Red Sea, thus indirectly linking the Red Sea to the Mediterranean through the Nile.   Strabo and Pliny record that the earliest effort was directed by Senusret III, but no evidence that there was an actual canal built exists.   The earliest efforts may have actually occurred at the command of Seti I or Ramesses II during the 13th century BC.

According to the Chronicle of the Pharaohs by Peter A. Clayton, under Necho II (610-595 BC) a canal was built between the Pelusian branch of the Nile and the northern end of the Bitter Lakes (which lies between the two seas)   at a cost of, reportedly, 100,000 lives.   However, over many years, the canal fell into disrepair, only to be extended, abandoned, and rebuilt again.   After having been neglected, it was rebuilt by the Persian ruler, Darius I (522-486 BC), who's canal can still be seen along the Wadi Tumilat.   According to Herodotus, his canal was wide enough that two triremes could pass each other with oars extended, and that it took four days to navigate. He commemorated the completion of his canal with a series of granite stelae set up along the Nile Bank.

This canal is said to have been extended to the Red Sea by Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285-246 BC), abandoned during the early Roman rule, but rebuilt again by Trajan (98-117 AD)   Over the next several centuries, it once again was abandoned and sometimes dredged by various rulers for various but limited purposes. Amr Ibn el-As rebuilt the canal after the Islamic takeover of Egypt creating a new supply line from Cairo, but in 767 AD, the Abbasid caliph El-Mansur closed the canal a final time to cut off supplies to insurgents located in the Delta. Of course, over time, ships grew in size and so the ancient attempts to connect the two seas would not have worked anyway today.

The...