The Suez Canal and his predecessors
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The Suez Canal, that connects the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea, was finished in 1869 but had several historical predecessors.
Chronology
Interactive Chronologies with maps are available in the section Changes Navigation
November 1869: The Suez Canal opened under French control in November 1869.
January 496 BC: During Darius's Greek expedition, he had begun construction projects in Susa, Egypt and Persepolis. He had linked the Red Sea to the river Nile by building a canal (Darius Canal) which ran from modern Zaqāzīq to modern Suez. To open this canal, he travelled to Egypt in 497 BC, where the inauguration was carried out with great fanfare and celebration. Darius also built a canal to connect the Red Sea and Mediterranean.
January 551: Islamic texts also discuss the canal, which they say had been silted up by the seventh century, but was reopened in 641 or 642 AD by 'Amr ibn al-'As, the Muslim conqueror of Egypt, and which was in use until closed in 767 in order to stop supplies reaching Mecca and Medina, which were in rebellion.
January 643: Islamic texts also discuss the canal, which they say had been silted up by the seventh century, but was reopened in 641 or 642 AD by 'Amr ibn al-'As, the Muslim conqueror of Egypt, and which was in use until closed in 767 in order to stop supplies reaching Mecca and Medina, which were in rebellion.
January 768: Islamic texts also discuss the canal, which they say had been silted up by the seventh century, but was reopened in 641 or 642 AD by 'Amr ibn al-'As, the Muslim conqueror of Egypt, and which was in use until closed in 767 in order to stop supplies reaching Mecca and Medina, which were in rebellion.
January 599 BC: At some point during his Syrian campaign, pharaoh Necho II initiated but never completed the ambitious project of cutting a navigable canal from the Pelusiac branch of the Nile to the Red Sea. Necho's Canal was the earliest precursor of the Suez Canal. It was in connection with a new activity that Necho founded a new city of Per-Temu Tjeku which translates as 'The House of Atum of Tjeku' at the site now known as Tell el-Maskhuta, about 15 km west of Ismailia. The waterway was intended to facilitate trade between the Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean.
