Mahmudiyya Canal

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MAHMUDIYYA CANAL

Artificial waterway in Egypt.

Built between 1817 and 1820 at the command of Muhammad Ali, viceroy of Egypt, this navigation canal connected Alexandria with the delta village of al-Atf and hence with Bulaq, the port city of Cairo. Its construction cost 35,000 purses (7.5 million French francs). Possibly as many as 300,000 peasants were conscripted to dig it during the period of concentrated work in 1819, costing between 12,000 and 100,000 casualties. Owing to the Nile floods, the canal has been dredged often, and annual improvements have been made since its construction. It also provided some summer irrigation and some of Alexandria's drinking water supply.

see also muhammad ali.


Bibliography


Rivlin, Helen Anne B. The Agricultural Policy of Muhammad Ali in Egypt. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1961.

arthur goldschmidt