The Suez Canal is known to connect the Mediterranean with the Red Sea, making it possible to significantly shorten the waterway from Europe to the Indian Ocean. Thanks to him, there is no need to go around Africa, and this is an absolute plus for maritime navigation.
In addition, the canal is considered the geographical border between Asia and Africa. The Suez Canal annually brings at least $ 5 billion to the treasury of Egypt, which is considered its owner, passing about eighteen thousand ships through itself.
In the days of the pharaohs
According to ancient sources, the idea of digging a canal across the Isthmus of Suez originated in ancient times. The Theban pharaohs of the era of the Middle Kingdom tried to build such a channel connecting the right branch of the Nile with the Red Sea. It is possible that it was successful. According to some reports, it was dug in the 19th century BC and was successfully used for trade with the semi-legendary country of Punt, as well as Mesopotamia and Harappa, but over time it fell into decay and had to be rebuilt.
The eminent pharaohs Ramses II and Neho II were involved in the restoration and reconstruction of the canal at different times. This is what the ancient Greek historian Strabo wrote: “The channel flows into the Red Sea, more precisely, into its Arabian Gulf near the city of Arsinoe, which is also called Cleopatria. It also passes through the Bitter Lakes; or rather, they were once bitter, and after the construction of the canal, their water mixed with the river and changed so much that now it is full of fish and birds. The canal began to build Senusret even before the Trojan War. Others, however, said that the son of Psammetichus began to build the canal, but he had just started working on it when he died right there. Later construction was continued by Darius I. True, this king believed the erroneous statements that the level of the Red Sea is higher than the Mediterranean and as soon as the isthmus that separates these two seas is dug, the water will flood the whole of Egypt,and ordered to stop the almost finished construction. But the Ptolemaic kings, in spite of this, completed the canal and began to float freely in the inner or outer sea in both directions."
However, Herodotus wrote that Darius still completed the construction of the canal. This is confirmed by the inscriptions of Darius on the stones, which still stand 20 kilometers north of Suez. This channel ran somewhat west of the present one, and its route is well traced. However, the magnificent building of Darius and the first Ptolemies did not survive the decline that occurred during the turmoil in the II century BC. It was restored by the Roman emperor Trajan, after which for two centuries Roman ships sailed through it to the shores of India and Arabia. Then decline followed again. After the Arab conquest of Egypt, the canal was rebuilt in 642, but it was covered with earth in 776 to direct trade through the main areas of the Caliphate. Desolation came to the isthmus for a thousand years.
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In 1671, the German encyclopedic scholar Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz proposed to the French king Louis XIV a plan to revive the canal, but royal advisers rejected it as a clear utopia. The situation began to change only during the Egyptian campaign of Napoleon Bonaparte. Engineer Leper was listed in the French train. This "civilian scientist" has long been interested in the problem of restoring the ancient canal. Napoleon allowed Leper to check the feasibility of the project on the spot and provided the necessary funds. The engineer checked and found that the project was not feasible, since the level of the Red Sea is as much as 10 meters above the Mediterranean sea level! However, quite soon Leper's conclusions were questioned by such eminent scientists as Pierre-Simon Laplace and Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier. They checked the version purely theoretically, but in practice it turned out to be wrong,which was established only in 1841-1847 by the engineers Linant, Stephenson, Bourdalon and Negrelli. It was they who proved that the water level in both seas is practically the same.
By that time, the star of the French diplomat and entrepreneur Ferdinand Lesseps had already risen. After reading Leper's book about the canal from the Mediterranean to the Red, he became infected with the idea of such a construction for the rest of his life. When the Egyptian khedive (viceroy), the "enemy of progress" Abbas Pasha, died in 1854, he was succeeded by Muhammad Said, a friend of Lesseps from his youth. Lesseps went to Egypt with congratulations, and at the same time provided the Khedive with a note about the canal: "The connection of the Mediterranean with the Red Sea through the seaworthy canal is an enterprise, the benefits of which attracted the attention of all the great people who reigned or temporarily ruled in Egypt."
Lesseps returned to Paris with a firman (a decree of the monarch in some Islamic states of the Near and Middle East - editor's note), giving him "the exclusive right to organize a company for the construction of the Suez Canal." In December 1854, detailed development of the project began. Lesseps himself, as well as engineers Lenan and Mougel, conducted reconnaissance on the spot. In the Bay of Suez and in the desert, they found traces of the canal of the ancient Egyptians. The depth of the new canal along its entire length was planned to be one - 6.5 meters below the level of the low waters of the Mediterranean Sea. It was planned to build dams in Suez and Peluza, but in the final version the international commission considered them unnecessary. The commission also decided to move the northern mouth of the canal 28 miles from Pelusa - to where the Port Said harbor soon emerged.
Lesseps became chairman of the General Company of the Suez Canal, which was entrusted with the construction of a grandiose hydraulic structure. He knew very well that enthusiasm alone cannot move millions of cubic meters of sand. The construction required colossal money at that time - 200 million francs. To get them, shares were issued: 400,000 shares, 500 francs each. However, at first the trading was not very successful: in France it was possible to sell a little more than 1000 shares, even less in Austria, which from the very beginning had a great interest in this venture. Russia subscribed to 24,000 shares. Success came only when the state took part in the enterprise. As a result, the Egyptian government received 44 percent of the shares, the French - 53 percent, the remaining 3 percent went to other shareholders.
Construction and celebrations
In April 1859, work began in the northern part of the isthmus. The conditions were appalling. Frequent floods carried away buildings and even people. The workers 'settlements were located 60 miles from the nearest settlements and two days' journey from Alexandria. During the day, in the tents, located under the rays of the scorching sun, there was unbearable heat, but at night the workers could not escape the cold and dampness, although they sheltered themselves with everything they could. In the dark, various amphibians crawled into the tents, dew accumulated on the roofs, from which they sagged and took the form of funnels. It was no better in dwellings on stilts, where the workers were overcome by rats and cold.
In the summer of 1865, cholera broke out in Egypt. Workers were given coffee and spirits. Meanwhile, a rumor spread throughout the country that everything was calm on the channel, and crowds of aliens from Egypt poured in there, bringing the infection with them. Panic seized the workers. They fled to the desert, to the sea, not knowing where. All the way from Ismailia to Port Said was strewn with the corpses of the unfortunate. This went on for three weeks. Then the cholera receded, and everything went on as usual.
Gradually, the desert isthmus filled with life. The post office and telegraph office appeared there. Finally came the historic opening day of the canal - November 17, 1869. In the morning, the harbor of Port Said was seething; distinguished guests were expected here. The first to appear was the French steamer "Eagle", on the deck of which stood Empress Eugenia, the wife of Napoleon III, surrounded by a brilliant retinue. Then the steamer "Greif" with the emperor of Austria-Hungary on board, the steamer "Grille" with the Prussian crown prince and the steam clipper "Yakhont" with the Russian ambassador to Constantinople, General Ignatov, entered the raid. The ships were greeted with a salute, and they answered it. Ferdinand Lesseps was, among other things, a good manager and journalist. He organized a ceremony of unprecedented pomp, inviting as many as five hundred cooks and a thousand footmen for six thousand guests. The composer Giuseppe Verdi was commissioned a new opera for the grand opening of the canal and the Italian theater in Cairo. It was then that the famous "Aida" was created.
The entire coast was decorated with masts. Behind the pier there were wooden, variegated wooden triumphal gates, and Egyptian troops lined up along the road with trellises. The solemn procession took place in a picturesque disorder along narrow wooden walkways, laid over deep sand, on which in places stood pools of sea water. After the khedive and foreign princes, spectators poured in, mingling with his retinue. The crowd flowed in a motley stream between the troops, along the houses, from the windows of which curious people leaned out.
The next day, 48 ships decorated with flags, in a predetermined order, moved through the canal. The first was the Empress Eugenia. The ancient and young canal began to live a full life again.
Magazine: Secrets of the 20th century №16, Valdis Peipinsh