Looking for the Freethinkers Cemetery!

OK, I've lived in Alexandria, Egypt for nearly 3 years now and I'm constantly learning new stuff about the place. Which is just as it should be, of course.

One interesting thing I recently learned is that....somewhere...Alexandria had a Freethinkers Cemetery--an entire graveyard just for planting atheists, agnostics, freethinkers, and General Troublemakers who refused to accept any religious creed, even in extremis supremo. :-)

I've visited most of the major ancient graveyards in Alexandria, but I have to admit this one has thrown me. It's mentioned in most of the tourist guidebooks and histories, but none of them say where the damn thing is actually located. One of the oldest Greek cemeteries is in walking distance of my apartment here--Mustafa Kamel, which dates back to the Fourth Century BCE when the city was founded. Those tombs are underground and built like Greek houses for the living of that time. One of them has a painted mural inside that is incredibly well preserved.

The Usual Irrelevant Trivia: Greek (or Macedonian) law strictly prohibited dead people within the city limits. With one famous exception, the "Soma" or tomb of Alexander The Great, which was located right in the middle of ancient Alexandria.

Tomorrow is the last day of my weekend here, which is Friday and Saturday. So I'm going to try and find that Freethinkers Cemetery. I'm guessing it is somewhere in the vicinity of the old Greek Orthodox cemeteries--a whole megaplex of dead people in downtown Alexandria.

Will report back if I find it!

How is it referred to in the tourist books as a place they put freethinkers out of respect for their positions or was it more of a 'potters field' kind of situation - no one else wanted them so they dumped these 'heathens' somewhere no one really cared about?

How old is it?

Found it! You probably already did, but I was bored . . .

ramses2.mmsh.univ-aix.fr/seminaires-Memoires/The-Cemeteries-of%20Alexandria.pps

It's a powerpoint presentation - click through until you get to an image of the Chatby cemeteries - the Freethinker section is marked.

If the link doesn't work (and I don't think it will), google "the cemeteries of Alexandria"

Do tell us about it when you get a chance!

No, I hadn't found it. This will help a lot. Chatby is a just a long walk from where I live, too.

Chatby is the place I meant with the old Greek Orthodox cemeteries. It also has some un-Orthodox, ancient pagan burial places in the same neighborhood. In fact, you can walk down the street around that area and pass one graveyard after another: Greek Orthodox, Coptic Christian, Catholic, etc.

On our favorite topic, religion...one of the saddest places in Alexandria is the old Grand Synagogue. Beautiul building, still with the Star Of David on top, but it has not been used for years. The front gates are rusted shut. To protect the building from loonies, it is guarded by police 24/7 and photographs are strictly forbidden.

Lots of people try to photograph it, since it's on a major tourist walking route--Nebi Daniel Street, right smack in the middle of town, near the ruins of the Roman amphitheatre/public baths/villas at Kom el-Dikka. Which literally means "Hill Of Rubble," since that's what the place was until 1960, when an archeological team dug up the Roman ruins.

Kom el-Dikka, in turn, is right behind Nebi Daniel Mosque, once rumored to have the remains of Alexander The Great hidden in a secret underground tomb. This has been debunked over and over, but you know how woo-woos are...

Yankey MCC: I first saw the Freethinkers' Cemetery mentioned in a local guidebook. I think that guidebook was published by the Community Times, which is a pretty good English-language monthly magazine here.

They didn't mention how old the place was. I would guess no older than the late 19th or early 20th century, when Alexandria had a large foreign population. The foreigners (and Jews) were driven out in two big purges: 1956 (after the Suez Crisis) and 1967 (after the Six Day War.)

They didn't mention it as a potter's field for the unwanted. Just as a separate space for the non-religious. Though it could very well have been that nobody wanted us in their graveyard!

every time you post?:-)
I would LOVE to see Egypt - really see it, as you do, by living there for a while. Toursita stuff leaves me cold and frustrated!

The necropoli of Alexandria sound utterly fascinating; there is so much to learn by examining how people deal with their dead. I love wandering around cemeteries, reading epitaphs and thinking about the human desire to prolong the "life" of the dead by building elaborate structures to house them.

A hint as to when the cemetery was established is found in a this article:
Textual Relations and Encyclopaedic Order in the Work of Larousse/ ﻋﻼﻗﺎﺕ ﺍﻟﻨﺼﻮﺹ ﻭﺍﻟﻨﻈﺎﻡ ﺍﻟﻣﻮﺳﻮﻋﻲ ﻋﻨﺪ ﻻﺭﻭﺱ
Magdi Wahba/ ﻣﺠﺪﻱ ﻭﻫﺒﻪ
Alif: Journal of Comparative Poetics, No. 4, Intertextuality/ التناص: تفاعلية النصوص‎. (Spring, 1984), pp. 26-41.

"Of course, the man's natural ebullience and optimism had carried him away. He was taking far too much for granted, and the
so-called 'clerical' party was still very strong. In fact, it was going from strength to strength. 'Clerical', however, was an epithet largely used by anti-clericals in discussing the Roman question, which loomed so large in the internal politics of France during the 1860's. Deschanel and Victor Hugo had used it as a term of abuse as far back as 1848 and Sainte-Beuve used it with increasing vehemence in his speeches in the Senate after 1866. But the true heyday of the word was to be after the defeat at Sedan. In the 1860's the attack on 'clericalism', as any form of stable 'belief in established order came to be called, coincided with the growth of free-thought, that composite humanist philosophy, which drew its principles from Renan's criticism of religion, Taine's criticism of contemporary philosophy and Littrt's reinterpretation of positivism. It is certainly as a means of propagation of 'free thought' that the Grand Dictionnaire was regarded by Larousse himself. His article on 'Libre pensee' in volume 10 makes the point absolutely clear:

Elle resume une des faces de I'esprit du XIXe sihcle que le Grand Dictionnaire doit recueillir
pour I'enseignement des ages futurs ... il faut, a Paris et dans tous les grands centres,
Clever un temple a la libre pensee auquel sera annex6 un cimetihre special ....

The 'special cemetery' he explains, was to be for the burial of all those whose consciences did not allow them to agree to being given a final resting place in consecrated ground. A fairly involved form of ceremonial was suggested by him, a sort of funerary procession with all the trappings of religious burial, but with a scrupulous avoidance of all appeals to God. There was something of the latter-day Comtism in this amalgam of liturgy and free-thought. Such cemeteries, moreover, were in fact designed some time after Larousse's death, with the help of a large section of the Masonic movement in France.

In 1875, the year of this death, it was still imperative to be a deist in order to become a Mason. LittrC, together with Jules Ferry, was admitted into the Lodge of the "Clemente AmitiC", affiliated to the Grand Orient de France on 8th. July 1875. Littre made a most interesting initiation address on that occasion, in which he was able to by-pass an explicit admission of atheism, thus putting some distance between himself and the official doctrines of Positivism. The General Assembly of the Grand Orient de France decided to change the article in its constitution about the need for a basic deistic belief to the following text:

"Elle (Freemasonry) a pour principes la IibertC absolue de conscience et
la solidarite humaine. Elle n'exclut personne pour ses crovances".

Naturally, this was tantamount to a declaration of independence from British freemasonry and the Supreme Council of Scottish Lodges,
which still uphold deism or even theism to this day. After 1877 the Grand Orient joined with free-thinkers in establishing Larousse's
cemeteries throughout the French-speaking world. It is a curious fact that such cemeteries still exist even in Cairo and Alexandria, intended for the Freemasons and free-thinkers among the European and Levantine communities, who were joined by the remnants of the Carbonari and the followers of Garibaldi who had sought refuge in Egypt."

...and now we know where that cemetery came from!

That was incredible. Wow! Alexandria certainly had large "European and Levantine communities," most of them involved with the import-export trade.

Down on Nebi Daniel Street (again), there is a small French Cultural Mission. It's housed in a beautiful old villa, but what really catches my eye is the elaborate front gate. It is flanked by two red-granite columns that were "recycled" from a building in ancient Alexandria.

You see that sort of thing all over the city. Along with many beautiful old French/Italianate/British villas that were seized by the government after the foreigners were driven out, which are just crumbling into ruins now. I got some photos of one mansion where you can see the fancy old wallpaper peeling off the walls of a ballroom inside. It looks like something out of a Stephen King novel.

A few foreigners managed to stay here. Just last year the owner of the Elite Pastry Shop downtown died, at the age of 96, IIRC. Amazing woman. She was personal friends with Laurence Durrell, Constantine Cavafy and many of the famous people who lived here.

One of her waiters was famous a few decades ago for trying to find the tomb of Alexander The Great. He would go out after work...around 2 in the morning...and dig holes at random all over the city. A few sprained ankles and broken legs later, the cops caught him and put an end to his personal archeological quest.

Thanks, onager! I appreciate the description of the town and the residents - it really helps bring it into focus! Such amazing history in Egypt; culture on top of culture, overlaid, combined, incorporated and still preserved in tiny, pristine elements . . . like the columns by the front gate.

I'm an historian. There are few things as keenly sweet as laying my hand on an crumbling wall or walking across cold stone and feeling the history come up through my fingers and my feet. I know it's just my imagination, but sometimes, if I listen hard enough, I can hear the echoes of those that passed before - who built those walls and floors and lived and loved and died there. Silly stuff, I guess. But those echoes are more real to me than any spirit mankind invents to protect itself from what it fails to understand.

I'm sure that Alexandria has its share - perhaps more than its share - of daily frustrations. But I'm sure it is still a wonder-filled place . . . and it is really nice to see that even after three years you still enjoying exploring and learning about it. I have really enjoyed reading your posts - funny and curious and filled with great tales worth telling!

Thanks again.

If I had to do it all over again, I think I would be a historian.

Here are a couple of great books on Alexandria:

Alexandria: A History And A Guide by E.M. Forster -- a reprint of Forster's 1922 book, which was out of print for decades. Forster worked as a hospital attendant in Alexandria during WWI. And sure enough, he wrote a lively and fascinating combination of history and guidebook about Alexandria.

Some of Forster's historical comments were guesswork by necessity, and have been subsequently proven wrong. Which doesn't lower the value of the book one bit. The guidebook sections were based on the city's tramlines, which are still operating today largely on the same routes Forster describes. I often take those trams. Every car still has a human conductor to issue your ticket, which costs the princely sum of 25 Egyptian Piastres--less than a nickel to ride all the way across the city!

Forster had an interesting personal experience on the trams, which is described in the next suggestion...

Alexandria: City Of Memory by Michael Haag -- now this is the REALLY interesting stuff! How E.M. Forster lost his virginity on a beach in Alexandria, with a British soldier. His long relationship with Mohammed Adl, a tramcar conductor. Where and how Lawrence Durrell met Eve Cohen (at a bar which is still in business, though it no longer serves alcohol).

And the amazing poet Constantine Cavafy, whose apartment is now a museum. When Cavafy lived there it was a whorehouse, and the book has a funny story about some quite lit'ery British types visiting Cavafy, opening the wrong door and getting quite a surprise. Cavafy, like Forster, was gay, and wrote quite honestly about that in some of his poems. Though just like Forster, in that day and age he kept publicly keep quiet about his sexuality.

I've used Forester to help illustrate some of the cultural peculiarities and changing perceptions of British imperialism for my students - it's also a good way to get them to read something other than blogs and text messages - but admit I haven't read this one. It's on the list now (so many good books, so little time . . .)!

The Haig book looks really interesting - the photos alone are worth taking the time for it (though I just got caught up in the preview on google books, so the text is more than worth it!)

Ran across this article that you might enjoy - also in Alif. You can access this, yes? If not, let me know and I'll download the pdf and get it to you.

Alexandria in Cavafy, Durrell, and Tsirkas
John Rodenbeck
Alif: Journal of Comparative Poetics, No. 21, The Lyrical Phenomenon/ al-Dhahirah al-Shi'riyah (2001), pp. 141-160

I've never read any of Laurence's books, but loved reading Gerald's stories of life on Corfu. In fact, I included one of his collections in a care package of books on tape for a legally blind, retired latin teacher to listen to.

Dang, now while I sit here in the plains, hoping it warms up past freezing, I won't be able to get images of The Garden of the Gods out of my head.

Sorry. I was posting around 6 AM, pre-coffee, I think...

LaWrence Durrell.

Found this note somewhere on the web. This book sounds interesting. A sort of biography Gerald wrote about his family:

His brother Gerald Durrell described life there in his book "My Family and Other Animals" (1956).

The house where Lawrence Durrell worked on "The Alexandria Quartet" is still standing in Alexandria. But maybe not for long. It's in very bad shape.

I ran into a similar thing when I was working in Saudi Arabia. I lived in Jeddah, and knew there was a house somewhere in that city where T.E Lawrence had lived.

Finally found it, but I had to wade thru a big mud flat to reach the place. And the Saudis were using it as a city bus park. The house itself was practically in ruins.

Part of the reason, maybe, is that T.E. Lawrence is not a hero in Saudi Arabia. He's seen as a colonialist interloper who backed the wrong family--the Hussein clan. Instead of the Sa'ud tribe, who as everyone knows were divinely intended to rule Arabia. :eyes:

According to a rumor I heard in Jeddah (may or may not be true), at one time the Saudis planned to just bulldoze Lawrence Of Arabia's former house. They were only stopped by protests from the British and American embassies.

It didn't exactly live up to the book but it was still fun.

I found about twenty minutes of it on Youtube:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=8KPwCD8IObY
http://youtube.com/watch?v=-407WdYB2go

I suppose I should add the Alexandria Quartet to my ever growing list of books I should read.

Have fun on your quest!!

I love checkiing in here, you guys rock.

Julie