Page:Biblical Libraries (Richardson).djvu/196

, it means a school, with library certainly, and probably assembly room, in the near vicinity. Whether the colonnade was or was not evolved from the groves or gardens in which (e.g. the Academy and the Lyceum) all the famous sects of scholars walked, it became a necessary part of the typical library as it was of the typical school, so that a library implied (Pergamon, Alexandria, Rome, Hadrian's at Athens, etc.) a colonnade.

It is with Aristotle and the Museum that library history begins to be definite. He himself founded in the Museum what is described as "the first systematic great library" and "taught the kings of Egypt library economy." When it is remembered that the first and greatest Alexandrian library in the Museum, is said by some to have been founded by the first Ptolemy, and was certainly in full swing by 280 B.C., and when one recalls farther that Alexandria was founded in 331,