Apis (

Greek Greek may refer to: 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 of all kno ...

: , 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. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

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

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

, and sometimes in

Marmarica Marmarica (, ) in Greco-Roman geography, ancient geography was a littoral area in Ancient Libya, located between ''Cyrenaica'' and ''Egypt (Roman province), Aegyptus''. It corresponds to what is now the Libya and Egypt frontier, including the t ...

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

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...

(iv. 5. § 5) mentions it as in the Libyae Nomos; and so does

Pliny the Elder Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24 79), known in English as Pliny the Elder ( ), was a Roman Empire, Roman author, Natural history, naturalist, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the Roman emperor, emperor Vesp ...

, 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 "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...

, xvii. p. 799).

References

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