Naucratis
Naucratis was a significant ancient Greek trading city located in Egypt, situated on the Canopic branch of the Nile, approximately forty miles southeast of modern Alexandria. Established during the reign of the Egyptian Pharaoh Psammetichus I, Naucratis developed as a commercial hub under Pharaoh Amasis, becoming a key treaty port connecting Greek traders with Egyptian markets. The city housed the Hellenium, a shared zone for several Greek states, including Chios and Rhodes, allowing merchants to engage in trade, bringing goods such as wine and oil to Egypt while exporting grain and linen back to Greece.
Despite its initial prominence, Naucratis faced competition from Alexandria following its founding by Alexander the Great. Under the Ptolemies, the city maintained its own local governance and briefly issued its own coinage. It also featured an Egyptian temple, indicating a blend of cultures, though Greek citizens were restricted from marrying Egyptian women. The city continued to function as a trading station even as it declined under Roman rule. Today, the archaeological site of Naucratis is largely overgrown, reflecting its rich historical legacy as a crossroad between Greek and Egyptian civilizations.
Naucratis
Naukratis (in Egyptian Piemro, now Kom Gieif)
A Greek city in Egypt, on the Canopic (western) branch of the river Nile (about forty miles southeast of the later Alexandria). The Egyptian Saite pharaoh Psammetichus (Psamtik) I (664–610 BC)—while settling Greek mercenaries at Daphne (Defenneh), on the eastern branch of the Nile—apparently allowed traders from Miletus to establish a market at Naucratis, which developed under Amasis (Ahmose, 570–526) into a major treaty port and commercial link with the west.
Various other Greek states also received concessions from the Egyptian monarch at Naucratis. The most important of these zones, the Hellenium, was held jointly by Chios, Clazomenae, Teos and Phocaea (Ionian), Rhodes, Halicarnassus, Cnidus and Phaselis (Dorian), and Mytilene (Aeolian). Aegina, Samos and Miletus possessed separate sanctuaries and probably concessions of their own. This was said by Herodotus to be the only port in Egypt to which Greek merchants were allowed to sail and in which they could live (although archaeological discoveries elsewhere now render this doubtful). They brought with them wine, oil and silver; and grain, papyrus and linen were among the wares that they took back. Some of the traders stayed on to become permanent residents, but it may have been a long time before the Egyptians granted them a civic organization. After the Persian invasion (525), the place continued to prosper although on a lesser scale.
When Alexander the Great conquered Egypt (332), he appointed Cleomenes, a former resident of Naucratis, as governor of the whole country. But Cleomenes was swept away by Ptolemy I Soter, under whom, moreover, the city was eclipsed by recently founded Alexandria as the principal Egyptian marketplace. Nevertheless, Naucratis continued to possess territory of its own and to function as an important trading station; it was the chief port of call on the inland voyage from Memphis to Alexandria to the frontier-post of Pelusium. During the earliest Ptolemaic epoch, for a short time, it issued its own local coinage, an exceptional phenomenon in Egypt.
Inscriptions show that buildings were erected under the first two Ptolemies. One of Ptolemy II's foundations was an Egyptian (not Greek) temple, reflecting a native element in the city—which remained separate, since Greek citizens were not permitted to marry Egyptian women. The `Damanhur Stele,’ an inscription of Ptolemy V Epiphanes (205–180) reproducing the hieroglyphic text of the Rosetta Stone, was found at Naucratis; and he himself went to the place to inspect a party of mercenary soldiers brought there by his eunuch-minister Aristonicus.
Under Roman rule, the city steadily declined, but was allowed to retain its own Greek constitution (which served as the model for Hadrian's foundation of Antinoopolis). Naucratis had formerly belonged to the Saite nome (district) but was now the capital of a nome bearing its own name. The site is now covered by lush vegetation.