Home From Alexander to the Middle Ages The 16th Century The 17th and 18th Centuries The 19th Century The evidence of travellers Back to Alexandria Home Page

The mapping of ports indicates an increase in naval traffic; and the multitude of cartographic documents that followed the French and English presence in Alexandria after 1800 denotes the gradual rise of Alexandria as a commercial centre. In 1829, several detailed plans were drawn by the French engineer De-Cerisy, who undertook to build an arsenal in Alexandria for Mohamed Ali. In the 1830s Alexandria started developing as a modern city and the importance of its Western Harbour gradually increased. Maritime traffic boomed. An ever increasing number of foreign vessels unloaded in the Western port - which Mohamed Ali opened to ships of all flags. There was a need for proper charts for navigation in the often treacherous shallows of the Western port, and British and French captains competed in the production of modern charts. But during the second half of the 19th century there was also an attempt at cartography related to the topography of Ancient Alexandria and its ports. Archaeologists and historians of the 19th and 20th centuries are greatly indebted to Mahmoud Bey el Falaki, who in 1865-66 drew two maps of Alexandria and its ports and vicinity.