Lighthouse of Alexandria (Pharos), Alexandria

For over a thousand years, the Pharos of Alexandria was one of the tallest structures in the world. Built on the island of Pharos in the harbour of Alexandria, it guided ships into one of the ancient world’s greatest ports. Earthquakes damaged it, builders stripped it for stone, and by the fourteenth century it had fallen out of use. Its name lives on in the word for lighthouse in many languages.

What Was It

The Pharos was a towered lighthouse built in three stages: a square base, an octagonal middle section, and a cylindrical top, capped with a statue, likely of Zeus or Poseidon. Ancient sources give its height as somewhere between 100 and 130 metres, which would have made it the second tallest structure in the ancient world after the Great Pyramid at Giza.

The Pharos of Alexandria in a coloured reconstruction engraving, c.1804–1811. Wellcome Collection, L0047776. CC BY 4.0.

A fire or mirror system at the top was said to be visible for 50 kilometres out to sea. Ancient writers debated whether the light came from fire alone or was amplified by polished metal mirrors. The base of the lighthouse held a ramp wide enough for horses and carts to carry fuel to the top.

Perspective view of the Pharos lighthouse above the harbour at Alexandria, coloured etching by Georg Balthasar Probst. Wellcome Collection, 2977797i. Public Domain Mark.

Where Was It

The Pharos stood on the eastern tip of the island of Pharos, which a causeway called the Heptastadion linked to Alexandria. That former island now forms a peninsula within the modern city. Today the Citadel of Qaitbay, a fifteenth- century Egyptian fortress, stands on the site and includes many stones taken from the ruined lighthouse.

Historical harbour plan of Alexandria showing the former island of Pharos and the site of the ancient lighthouse.

Key Dates

c.297 BCE. Ptolemy I Soter commissions the Pharos.
c.280 BCE. The lighthouse is completed under Ptolemy II Philadelphus.
956. An earthquake causes the first significant structural damage.
1303. A major earthquake in the eastern Mediterranean causes severe damage.
1323. Arab traveller Ibn Battuta visits Alexandria and finds the lighthouse already too ruined to enter.
1375. A further earthquake reduces the Pharos to a ruin.
1477. The Mamluk Sultan Qaitbay builds his citadel on the site using lighthouse stones.
1994. Underwater archaeologists discover submerged remains of the lighthouse on the harbour floor.

Historical engraving of a ruined tower on the shore at Alexandria.

Key Players

Sostratus of Cnidus is named by ancient sources as the architect of the Pharos. An inscription on the building reportedly read: “Sostratus of Cnidus, son of Dexiphanes, to the saviour gods, on behalf of those who sail the seas.” Ptolemy is said to have demanded his own name be placed there instead, but Sostratus reportedly cut his own name into the stone beneath a layer of plaster carrying the king’s name, knowing the plaster would one day fall away.

Ptolemy I Soter commissioned the lighthouse and began construction.

Ptolemy II Philadelphus oversaw its completion.

Ibn Battuta, the Moroccan traveller, visited Alexandria in 1323 and left one of the last eyewitness accounts of the structure, already partially collapsed.

Line drawing of a Greek dedication inscription carved in stone, standing in for the lost inscription of Sostratus of Cnidus.

The Story Behind It

The Pharos was so well known in antiquity that its name, taken from the island it stood on, became the word for lighthouse in French (phare), Italian (faro), Spanish (faro), and many other languages. Writers in the ancient and medieval world admired it, described it, and copied its form for well over a thousand years.

Medieval-style illustration of a tall tower beside the sea, similar to later manuscript depictions of the Pharos.

Arab geographers of the 10th and 11th centuries wrote detailed accounts of the Pharos and claimed that a mirror at the top could spot and even burn enemy ships far out at sea. Whether this was fact or legend, it shows how strongly the building gripped the medieval imagination.

The underwater survey of 1994 found large stone blocks on the harbour floor, some of them recognisable as parts of the lighthouse. Archaeologists and local authorities have discussed underwater excavation and a possible submerged archaeological park, but full plans have yet to be carried out.

The Citadel of Qaitbay that now stands on the site includes so much stone from the Pharos that archaeologists can pick out lighthouse masonry in its walls. The destroyer built from the destroyed.

“The Pharos gave its name to every lighthouse in the world. It is still standing, in a sense, in every harbour.”

Historical view of the Citadel of Qaitbay on the site of the Pharos, suggesting the reuse of lighthouse stone in its walls.

What Came After It

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