Apis (

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

: , named for the god ''Apis''), was an ancient seaport town ( Polyb. ''Exc. Leg.'' 115) on the north coast of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

, about 18 km west of Paraetonium, sometimes considered located within

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...

, and sometimes in Marmarica. Scylax (p. 44) places it at the western boundary of Egypt, on the frontier of the Marmaridae.

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importanc ...

(iv. 5. § 5) mentions it as in the

Libyae Nomos Marmarica (Greek Μαρμαρική) in ancient geography was a littoral area in Ancient Libya, located between ''Cyrenaica'' and ''Aegyptus''. It corresponds to what is now the Libya and Egypt frontier, including the towns of Bomba (ancient ' ...

; and so does

Pliny the Elder Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/2479), called Pliny the Elder (), was a Roman author, naturalist and natural philosopher, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the emperor Vespasian. He wrote the encyclopedic ' ...

, who calls it ''nobilis religione Aegypti locus'' (v. 6, where the common text makes its distance west of Paraetonium 72 Roman miles, but one of the best manuscripts gives 12, which agrees with the distance of 100 stadia in

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called " Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-sighted that he could s ...

, xvii. p. 799).

References

*{{SmithDGRG Cities in ancient Egypt Populated coastal places in Egypt Roman sites in Egypt Former populated places in Egypt