The Canal of the Pharaohs: the ancient Suez Channel

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The Canal of the Pharaohs was an ancient channel that connected the Nile to the Red Sea. Originally started by the ancient Pharaohs, the building of this channel was probably finished by the Persian Emperor Darius the Great, after the Persian conquest of Egypt.

The first Egyptian Pharaoh who tried to build a channel between the Nile and the Red sea was Sesostris (1878-1839), a Pharaoh of the 12th dynasty. He was however faced with the insurmountable obstacle of the difference between the water levels of the river and the sea, which led him to abandon the project.

Later on, the construction project was restarted by Pharaoh Necho II (610-595). Ancient sources diverge on whether he actually finished building the channel. Even if he did, his channel didn’t last long.

After the Persian conquest of Egypt, Emperor Darius the Great decided to finish (or to rebuild) the channel. Five major Egyptian monuments commemorate the building of the channel by Darius. The propaganda around this project aims to present Darius as a building Emperor, who continued the work of the ancient Pharaohs.

But did Darius actually finish building the channel? His monuments claim that he did; but several ancient authors, like Aristotle, Strabo and Pliny the Elder, say that he didn’t. Anyway, it is certain that his project was more advanced that his predecessors’.

After Alexander the Great died, the new Greek King of Egypt Ptolemy II also started working on the channel. He was the first one to solve the problem of the different water levels, by building water locks. The channel was again rebuilt by Roman Emperor Trajan. Emperor Diocletian built a fortress to protect its entrance.

At the time of the Islamic conquest of Egypt, the channel was silted with sand, until Amr ibn Al-As reopened it. Its entrance to the Red Sea was definitively closed in 767, so that it couldn’t be used to deliver supplies to the Alid rebellion in Mecca. The section close to the Nile, called Khalil, remained in use as part of the water infrastructure system of the city of Cairo, until it was fully covered in 1890. It is now the Port Said Street, in Cairo.