The Night The Library Of Alexandria Burned (Nobody Agrees What Actually Happened)

Somewhere in Alexandria, on a night more than two thousand years ago, a building caught fire. Inside were somewhere between forty thousand and four hundred thousand scrolls — the largest collection of written knowledge the ancient world had ever assembled. Nobody agrees on the exact number. Nobody even agrees it happened in one night. This video follows four people through that fire. A scholar who has twenty minutes to decide what to save and spends the rest of his life wondering about everything he left behind. A soldier following orders in a naval battle who has no idea what his tactical decision is about to destroy. A priest who chooses to pray instead of run, and considers his survival proof that he was right. And a poor fisherman who can't read a single word on the scrolls he's collecting — and doesn't need to, because paper is paper, and tonight there's more free paper than he's ever seen in his life. There's no villain in this story. That's what makes it hard to sit with.