The Roman Granary

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No one knows the origin of the name of Babylon-in-Egypt. It may be a corrupted version of the ancient Egyptian per-hapi-n-on, or Nile House of On, a nearby Island. It might have come from the Arabic Bab-ila-on, or gateway to On. Or it may be simply a name the Babylonian prisoners of the Pharaoh Sesostris gave to the place. Anyway, Babylon-in-Egypt was more a strategic spot than an intellectual center. With the re-opening of the Ancient Egyptian Canal joining the Nile to the Red Sea, the town became the gateway to Persia and India. Control over the Fortress of Babylon therefore meant control over trade. And while Alexandria was the political and intellectual capital of Egypt under the Greeks and the Romans, Babylon became its military stronghold.

The year 30 B.C. marked a significant turning point in the history of Egypt and the world at large. It was the year when the victorious Octavian (Augustus) entered Alexandria. His former ally and rival Mark Antony died, and Cleopatra ended her own life, realizing that her time was over. Although Cleopatra was of Greek descent, she, like her ancestors, ruled Egypt as and Egyptian. She was both Queen and Pharaoh. With her death, Egypt simple became just another Roman province, a Roman granary rather than a world power.

With the birth of Christianity, the capital city Alexandria witnessed of a violent confrontation between the Egyptian followers of the new religion (the Copts) and the Greek and Roman Pagans. Christianity, then widely accepted among native Egyptians, found a safe place to grow away from the eyes of the Roman rulers. It was here that the Holy Family rested when they came to Egypt. It was inside and near the Fortress walls that many of the oldest churches in the world were later built: The Hanging (Muallaqa), Abu Sergah, Mar Guirguis, and others. When later the Romans adopted Christianity as their official religion, the population of Babylon was virtually all Christian.

For many years, the Fortress of Babylon remained a symbol of Roman power. It was in the Seventh century that the balance shifted toward a new power. Following years of exhausting war in the region between the Romans and the Persians, both armies were swept away by the Moslem horsemen who emerged unexpectedly out the Arabian Peninsula. And it took the Arabs little more than 10 years to conquer Syria, Palestine, Persia, and knock on the doors of the Fortress of Babylon in Egypt.