Editing Memphis, Egypt (section)

===Sources from antiquity===
Beginning with the second half of the first millennium BC, the city was detailed more and more intensely in the words of ancient historians, especially with the development of trade ties with Greece. The descriptions of the city by travellers who followed the traders in the discovery of Egypt have proved instrumental in reconstructing an image of the glorious past of the ancient capital. Among the main classical authors are:
* [[Herodotus]], Greek historian, who visited and described the monuments of the city during the first [[Persian people|Persian]] [[Achaemenid]] rule in the fifth century BC <ref>Herodotus, ''The Histories'' (Vol II), paragraphs 99, 101, 108, 110, 112, 121, 136, 153 and 176.</ref>
* [[Diodorus Siculus]], Greek historian, who visited the site in the first century BC, providing later information about the city during the reign of the Ptolemies <ref>Diodorus Siculus, ''Bibliotheca historica'' (Vol I), Ch. I, paragraphs 12, 15 and 24; Ch. II, paragraphs 7, 8, 10, 20 and 32.f</ref>
* [[Strabo]], the [[Hellenistic]] geographer, who visited during the Roman conquest in the late first century BC <ref>Strabo, ''Geographica'', Book XVII, chapters 31 and 32.</ref>

Subsequently, the city is often cited by other Latin or Greek authors, in rare cases providing an overall description of the city or detailing its cults, as do [[Suetonius]]<ref>Suetonius, ''The Twelve Caesars'', Part XI: Life of Titus.</ref> and [[Ammianus Marcellinus]],<ref>Ammianus Marcellinus, ''Roman History'', Book XXII, § XIV.</ref> who pay particular attention to the city's worship of Apis.

The city was plunged into oblivion during the Christian period that followed. Few sources are available to attest to the city's activities during its final stages.

It was not until the conquest of the country by the Arabs that a description of the city reappears, by which time it was in ruins. Among the major sources from this time:
* [[Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi (medieval writer)|Abd-al-Latif]], a famous geographer of Baghdad, who in the thirteenth century gives a description of the ruins of the site during his trip to Egypt
* [[Al-Maqrizi]], Egyptian historian in the fourteenth century, who visited the site and describes it in detail