Alexandria National Museum

The Palace of Basily or as it called nowadays Alexandria National Museum, As’ad Pasha Basily came from the Levant, settled in Alexandria city of knowledge  and Literature and art. He worked in wood trading with his older brother and in no more than 10 years he became famous in his career, in his live in Alexandria he built a mosque for his workers to pray after seeing them suffering to go to the far mosque every day and his famous palace which we will know more about in the next lines.

The Palace of Basily Pasha was bought in 1954 A.D to the American embassy for 53,000 EGP and the continued to be the embassy till 1996 A.D when the Egyptian government bought it from the American embassy for 12 Million EGP and decided to convert and prepare the palace to be the National Museum of Alexandria, the grand opening was in 2003 A.D with the presence of the President at that time Hosni Mubarak. 

The Museum serving as an important place of knowledge and art gathering rare pieces from all over Alexandria even from under the sea that showing the all the periods passed on Alexandria. The Museum consists of many halls; each hall shows a specific period and the shape of the life in this period, first hall shows Egyptian antiquities with unique and rare pieces from the three Kingdoms of Egypt; from the Old Kingdom you will find the famous statue of the seated writer in ancient Egypt with some jars was brought from the Step Pyramid of King Djoser, from the Middle Kingdom you will find a statue of King Amenemhet III with the realism in the wrinkles in his face and from the New Kingdom you will find a head of Queen Hatshepsut, a head of King Akhenaten, some statues for King Tuthmose III and statue King Ramses II.

In the Greco-Roman hall; you will find also Hellenistic pieces (Hellenistic Period said to be the period after the death of Alexander the great till the end of the Ptolemaic period) with Greek and Roman special pieces in addition to with a special part for the rescued statues from the Mediterranean Sea. Of course when we talk about the different periods that was in Alexandria of course we will talk about the about the Coptic and Islamic hall where you will see the bronze, silver and copper tools that the Coptic people used to use and some coins from the Islamic period and textiles, you will also find some belongings from the period of Muhammad Ali family as silver and golden jewelry.